Frank Lloyd Wright comes to California

Some of Frank Lloyd Wright’s most engaging and innovative architecture was done in Southern California in the years following the end of World War I. From 1919 to 1923, the architect worked part-time in the newly-sprung Los Angeles metropolis, during the midst of a tremendous economic boom fueled in part by the explosion of the personal automobile and the petroleum industry maturing in California at that time. In a span of only 4 years he created new forms of American architecture that we can still look to for inspiration. (At the same time, he was engaged to build the monumental Imperial Hotel in Japan, arguably one of his greatest achievements.)

Above: the Alice Millard House, also known as La Miniatura, 1923, in Pasadena, a short walk from The Gamble House, Charles and Henry Greene's 1908 masterwork of American Arts & Crafts architecture.

Below: detail of the Samuel Freeman House, also circa 1923, just up the hill from Hollywood Boulevard.

After building the Hollyhock House in 1921, his first project in California, Wright set out to create 4 more homes in the Los Angeles area using his new “textile block” system of cast concrete blocks. In addition to the Millard House and Freeman House shown above, he built the Storer House at the west end of Hollywood Boulevard (bought and restored in the 1980s and still in private hands), and the Ennis House, in the Hollywood Hills below the Griffith Observatory.

Wright's patterned cast concrete looks great, especially as it is shadowed by the unique light of Southern California. This construction method embodies his ideal of “organic architecture:” sand in the concrete came from the construction sites. While the concrete was beautifully handled by the genius Wright, it has proven to be highly susceptible to aging and all the buildings have required tremendous work in recent decades just to keep them standing. Even with rebar tying the blocks together, this construction technique probably wasn't the best choice for a region beset by earthquakes and torrential rains.

Below: the Storer House, Hollywood, California (private):

Below: the Ennis House, Hollywood, California. Notice that the building is clad in construction scaffolding; this was during 2007's long-needed stabilization project to secure the home on its hillside perch.

Here are some photos of the concrete blocks disintegrating at the building's foundation, and a New York Times article from 2005 about the restoration of the Ennis House.

Technorati Tags: architecture, California, EnnisHouse, FrankLloydWright, FreemanHouse, LosAngeles, MillardHouse, StorerHouse

The Bradbury Building, Los Angeles: an architectural treasure

The Bradbury Building [Wikipedia]  is a polished gem of historic architecture in downtown Los Angeles, built in 1893 and famous for its awe-inspiring light-filled central atrium with rich details. Best known for being used in the film Blade Runner, the building got run down over the years, until a major renovation in the early 1990s brought the edifice back to its former glory. The famous interior is a symphony of polished oak railings, doors and ceilings; ornate black cast iron balustrades and columns; yellow glazed and flat   bricks walls; creamily-colored floor tiles; and maroon and white marble stair steps. Check out these historic photos on the Library of Congress website.

Here are some photos I shot in June 2007 of this spectacular interior atrium.

Below: detail of the railing on the second floor's mezzanine.

 Below: looking across the central atrium.

Below: the floor in the central atrium.

Technorati Tags: architecture, BradburyBuilding, historic, LosAngeles

Bullocks Wilshire building: an Art Deco classic in Los Angeles

A store like no other, the architectural gem is considered a national treasure, part of the fabric of Los Angeles, indelibly etched into the city's cultural soul. Historian David Gebhard calls the building “one of the key monuments of the art deco style in America and the most beautifully and consistently carried out.” Noted Los Angeles architect, Albert C. Martin says, “Bullock's was a magnificent architectural expression, a high quality design using outstanding materials. It created a new spirit in retailing.” Historian Kevin Starr wrote that Bullock's Wilshire “celebrated and climaxed the expansion of a decade… reflecting the confidence and optimism of Los Angeles.” (from Balcony Press)

In 1988-1989, I dated a woman who worked as a buyer for Bullocks Wilshire. In the morning, she'd drop me off at my job at McManus & Morgan (see my blog post) on 7th Street, a few blocks away. After I got off work at 5:30pm (a 9 hour day, a job I worked for eight years) I'd walk over to this amazing building and wait for her in the building's famous porte-cochere, through which wealthy Angelenos drove their pricey cars.

Technorati Tags: architecture, ArtDeco, BullocksWilshire, LosAngeles, WilshireBoulevard

Hello, Los Angeles (1985)

What I saw out my window after I got to Los Angeles in 1985: the view from 757 South New Hampshire, Apartment #409.

Illusions they come as reality shows
The sparklejets in my eyes, like little diamonds in snow
This ticket’s one-way and my momma is crying
To crazy Los Angeles, gonna give a try
Gave it my best try

— Junkalow, Between Love and Lost

Julius Shulman (Case Study House photographer) speaks at Art Center College of Design, Nov. 4, 2006

As part of The Gamble House's lecture series, “legendary architectural photographer Julius Shulman will discuss his body of work, including his recent project photographing the newly renovated Getty Villa in Malibu. Since 1936 Shulman has been the visual recorder of modern designs throughout 45 states of the country and internationally.”

We know him best as the photographer of Case Study House #22 and the iconic image which he created, showing this masterpiece of modernism hovering over the Los Angeles cityscape.

Shulman, who celebrated his 96th birthday on October 10, was recently commissioned to re-photograph Case Study House #21, which will be sold through auction on December 3, 2006.

Also on Le Blog Exuberance:

• Case Study House #21 ~ buy your own Pierre Koenig pad
• Meeting Pierre Koenig in Case Study House #22
• Case Study Number 22 / mashup

Technorati Tags: architecture, CaseStudy, CaseStudyHouse21, CaseStudyHouseNumber22, LosAngeles, modernarchitecture, modernism, PierreKoenig, JuliusShulman

Case Study House #21 ~ buy your own Pierre Koenig pad

Pierre Koenig's Case Study House #21 (built in 1958 at 9038 Wonderland Park Ave, Los Angeles, CA) will be going on sale at Wright Auctions (Chicago) on December 3, 2006. Check out their official site. They've hired photographer Julius Shulman to re-shoot the house which he shot years ago for the new catalog. See also the floor plan.

(Photos: Wright Auctions)

Above: David Travers, Arts & Architecture magazine

From the Wright website, this description:

Pierre Koenig's Case Study House #21, now carefully and immaculately restored to the original intent and design of the architect, is an architectural landmark located in the Hollywood Hills. Completed early within his career, the steel and glass residence is a pure expression of Koenig's approach to design. Using a reduced range of materials, he created a living space that gracefully reflects the demands, conditions, and requirements of modern living in Los Angeles.

The spare structure is balanced by five reflection pools that completely surround the house and serve both cooling functions and as visual transitions between building and site. Intellectually, historically and aesthetically, the house is a pristine modern object.

Wright will offer this important real estate at auction on 03 December 2006.

Estimate $2.5–3.5 million

More on Le Blog Exuberance:

• Meeting Pierre Koenig in Case Study House #22
• Case Study Number 22 / mashup

Technorati Tags: CaseStudy, CaseStudyHouse21, CaseStudyHouses, LosAngeles, modern, modernarchitecture, modernism, pierrekoenig, southerncalifornia, WestHollywood

Van Nuys: A California Suburb in Decline

Certain neighborhoods in Los Angeles which have been declining for years will continue to decline — and it doesn't take a PhD to figure out which ones those will be. Los Angeles is an extremely young city and the dust is just settling into the forms that will then hold true for at least a few generations. Van Nuys, located in the middle of the San Fernando Valley, will grow as a place of low-income residents because it no longer has value to the modern American middle class economy.

Van Nuys was  a ready-made suburb to house thousands of middle class families following World War II. The Baby Boom happened in Van Nuys — and hundreds of other similar cities around America in the 1940s and 50s. Soldiers who returned from fighting the Japanese or Germans could buy a federally-financed home, work in an aerospace factory or attend a free community community college, or use the GI Bill to pay for a first-rate university graduation.

Van Nuys was one of many instant communities that were built for a specific economic condition. The booming post-war suburbs of Los Angeles played a legendary role in the growth of modern America; with that function fulfilled, these ticky-tack places will often fall by the economic wayside. Today, Van Nuys has nothing to offer most middle class families in Southern California. Instead, it represents one of suburbia's failures, with its porn shops, littered streets, graffiti, and the distinct tincture of residents who are most definitely not keeping up with the Joneses. For the good life, those who can afford to will shun Van Nuys and aim afield for places like Woodland Hills, Agoura, Santa Clarita — or any place in L.A.'s wide constellation of suburbs where real estate prices are solid and the riff-raff is at bay.

The surest sign of how a neighborhood will be in the future is to look to how it is right now: it is far more likely to stay the same than it is to change (and it is far less likely to change for the better than it is to change for the worse). We'll probably not see the sweeping reforms of "urban renewal" dreaded by cityphiles like Jane Jacobs, because the federal government is no longer in the city rebuilding business, like it was in the 1950s and 60s. The form which our cities now display will, more likely than not, become entrenched.

Photo by Kaptain Krispy Kreme on Flickr.

Just as the rich are getting richer in the overall economy, so too will rich neighborhoods get richer, as  poor ones continue downhill. The economy of our era is one of consolidation and the steady flow of money from the poor to the wealthy; the rich will continue to pour their money into ever-more solid upper- middle class enclaves, where their real estate investment is protected from decline.

Case Study Number 22 / mashup

Barbed wire, invented to fence the American West. This land is your land, this land is my land. Come and get a piece of the dream, kiddo.

And on and on it goes, Western Avenue is paved, the Engelmann oaks are cut down, the water is brought in, who doesn't hate cold winters, dollar fares to sunny Los Angeles, oranges behind the bungalow, snow capped Mt. Baldy out the picture window.

Dust bowl refugees getting their footing, returning soldiers, post-war optimism, an aerospace industry enriches the educated classes, freeways mobilize, and the International Style draws new lines.

Modernism, Art & Architecture magazine, the Case Study houses, young architect Pierre Koenig, Case Study House #22.

Endlessly reproduced, the iconic image captured by photographer Julius Shulman. A chance meeting with the architect decades after its building.

(from the J. Paul Getty Trust website)

Time passes. Accumulations, and discards. The fence pieces, the image, a natural fit. The home, you can't, not anymore. Too many coming in, too many being born, just a blip, an accident of history, no more trailers by the beach, too much cash, debtor nation, every 9th person wants to sell me a house, loan me hundreds of thousands of dollars, piles of debt, it would seem, does not matter, U.S.A., freedom to shop at WalMart 24 hours a day, freedom to drive forever and eat McDonalds, free to give our lives for a lie, free to elect scoundrels, free to give up what makes America so good.

More on Le Blog Exuberance:

• Case Study House #21 ~ buy your own Pierre Koenig pad
• Meeting Pierre Koenig in Case Study House #22

Technorati Tags: architecture, california, modernism, pierrekoenig

Technorati Tags: architecture, california, CaseStudy, CaseStudyHouseNumber22, CaseStudyHouses, modernism, pierrekoenig

Los Angeles: Tropical Storm Clouds in Silverlake and Griffith Park, 1992

These dark clouds mixed with low sun were typical of the tropical storms that sometimes drenched Los Angeles. One of many moments of sheer beauty in Los Angeles, which pop up between durations of smog and sun, and which go a long way toward redeeming the city.

Below: houses in Silverlake, Los Angeles. March 7, 1992.

Below: Griffith Park and Hollywood sign, Los Angeles. March 7, 1992.

Mt. Wilson Towercam, above Pasadena in the San Gabriel Mountains

My favorite webcam is the 150-Foot Solar Tower Towercam, located at the Mount Wilson Observatory on Mt. Wilson, just above Pasadena, California in the San Gabriel Mountains. Apparently there was a Minotaur rocket launch tonight from Vandenberg Air Force Base out on Point Conception, California (on the Pacific coastline 140 miles northwest of Los Angeles). It left the spectacular contrail seen below after sunset at 7:34p.m. Details from Spaceflight Now.

Check out these rocket launch links:

• Fred's Astronomy stuff: rocket launches - includes photos from the September 22, 2005 launch
• Viewing Vandenberg AFB Launches
• Flickr photos tagged “Vandenberg”