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Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Sarasota Modern

The California-based Case Study House project and all the architects made famous by it receive a tremendous amount of attention, but their Florida counterparts are often overlooked. The Sarasota School of Architecture was started by Ralph Twitchell. Among its primary practitioners were Paul Rudolph, Edward "Tim" Seibert, Gene Leedy, Carl Abbott, Jack West, Mark Hampton, and Victor Lundy.

The Sarasota School was inspired, at least in part, by the Bauhaus philosophies, but it incorporated traditional forms of Southern U.S. architecture, using patios, verandas, modular construction and raised floors to allow for greater ventilation in Florida's pre-air conditioning days.

The style took advantage of the play or light and shadow, the color and texture of regional material and the beautiful environment of Sarasota. Many of these homes are extant today. Take a look at some of these examples.

From sarasotaarchitecturalfoundation.org



Milam Residence by Paul Rudolph
wallpaper.com

Cocoon House by Paul Rudolph
architizer.com

Hiss Studio by Tim Seibert
safsrq.wordpress.com

Weaving/Thomasson House by Gene Leedy
paulrudolph.blogspot.com

Dolphin House by Carl Abbott
sarasotavisualarts.com

Lake Shore Drive home by Jack West
zillow.com

Horizon House by Mark Hampton
archiplanet.org

Herron House by Victor Lundy
heraldtribune.com

16 comments:

  1. I would love to live in the studio of Tim seibert

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  2. Overlooked no more! Thanks for sharing, put me down for the Hiss Studio! x

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    1. Another vote for Seibert's design. It's beautiful!

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  3. All gorgeous, but I think the Horizon House is my fave.

    note: I said, think...

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  4. Simple without being boring - and they seem to sit well in their respective landscapes.

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    1. I think these architects gave a lot of thought about using the landscape as a design element.

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  5. Living in the Milam would mean living in a piece of sculpture.

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    1. Yes, it would. I feel the same way about the Herron House.

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  6. Rudolph was probably one of the hottest architects in the 60's his perspective drawings were amazing.

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    1. In many of the things I read, Rudolph was said to have been the standout of the group, and I actually think the Cocoon House is my favorite of all these. Why do you think the West Coast architects have had so much more written about them over the years?

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  7. Perhaps the magazines House Beautiful, Sunset magazine and Arts and Architecture for the Case Study houses helped recognize the West coast. Just bought a House Beautiful 1959 magazine devoted to Frank Lloyd Wright. Maybe I see a post on these.

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    1. I've been gathering information for a post about the Usonian homes.

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  8. These Florida homes are wonderful, I think Julius Schulman and the amount of press helped the Case Study Houses to fame, but a lot of them are REALLY experimental and certainly deserve all the attention they got. Just the fact that they were part of this project that aimed to break ground for a new ideas makes them interesting.

    Oh, I'm looking forward to your post about the Usonian homes, I'm a huge FLW fan and so is my boss, were constantly drooling over a large book in our office with all his projects. I visited Oak Park many years ago, it was such a thrill to see the evolution of his work there.
    Great post Dana!

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    1. Arts & Architecture kept the Case Study Houses in the public eye for a very long time, which I'm sure helped. And I'm sure it didn't hurt that movie stars were commissioning the West Coast architects to build homes for them, getting them even more press. And, yes, the Sarasota architects would have benefited from finding their own Julius Schulman.

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