Mid2Mod: Search results for case study house program

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Monday, July 23, 2012

Kemper Nomland, Jr.

Kemper Nomland, Jr. (1919-2009) was an modernist architect, painter, and printer of books of poetry from Los Angeles, California. He received his bachelor's degree in architecture from the University of Southern California in 1941 and went to work for Albert C. Martin before forming a father-and-son architecture team with Kemper Nomland, Sr.

Together they designed Case Study House #10 at 711 San Rafael in Pasadena, California, as part of the Case Study House Program sponsored by Arts & Architecture magazine. This program was a forum for experimentation in low-cost modern housing for middle-class families and involved other major architects, such as Richard Neutra, Ralph Rapson, Pierre Koenig, A. Quincy Jones, Raphael Soriano and Craig Ellwood. Case Study House #10 exemplified many of the goals of the program, including the use of low-cost materials and a modern aesthetic. The home was built on a slope, and the home's roofline mirrored its environment. Large walls of glass and a floor heating system were features of the interior. Large openings to the outside allowed for a melding of the indoors and outdoors.

Nomland was a conscientious objector during World War II and was confined to Civilian Public Service Camp #21 near Cascade Locks, Oregon, where he did forest maintenance work, as well as CPS Camp #56, Camp Angel, near Waldport, Oregon, where he did printing work and became friends with a group of poets and artists. He designed the chapel at CPS Camp #21, and seven of his paintings done while there (or influenced by his experience there) are held by Lewis and Clark College. He illustrated a book of poems entitled War Elegies by William Everson, whom he met while at the CPS camps.

Nomland designed several commercial properties and approximately a dozen residences. One of his best known designs was the Albers Residence, which was built in 1955. He designed the 18-unit garden apartment complex known as the Apex Apartment building and a duplex for builder Bill Jadiker, whom he met at Camp Angel. He also designed a home for actress Jane Russell.

From housing.com and latimes.com

Case Study House #10
la.curbed.com

Case Study House
hausangeles.com

Case Study House guest house
hausangeles.com

Albers Residence
la.curbed.com

Albers Residence
takesunset.com

Albers Residene
trulia.com

Apex Apartments
flickriver.com - Michael Locke

Jadiker Duplex
thesilverlakenews.com

Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Whitney R. Smith

Whitney R. Smith (1911-2002) was born in Pasadena, California. He received a bachelor's degree in architecture from the University of Southern California in 1934. Because there were few positions available in his field, he worked for a time building movie sets. He then worked for several architects, including Harwell Hamilton Harris, an early modernist whom Smith considered a strong influence on his work.

Smith opened his own practice in the early 1940s and was joined by Wayne R. Williams in 1946. Williams became a partner in 1949, and for the next 24 years, the firm of Smith and Williams created residences, schools, community buildings and recreational facilities that won state and national awards.

In 1946 Smith joined the Case Study House Program, designing Case Study House #5, known as the Loggia House, and Case Study House #12. Though neither house was built, they were considered two of the most experimental and innovative in the program.

From 1946 to 1950 Smith joined with A. Quincy Jones to design and build the Mutual Housing Association development, a large tract of houses in the Crestwood Hills neighborhood in Brentwood, a district in western Los Angeles. Also participating were architects Doug Honnold, John Lautner, Francis Lockwood, engineer Edgardo Contini and landscape architect Garrett Eckbo. However, because of their exposure in Arts & Architecture magazine while participating in the Case Study House Program, Jones, Smith and Contini eventually received full credit for the project.

Some of the projects of Smith and Williams were the Unitarian Church in Pasadena, the UCLA north campus student union and the UCLA Canyon Recreation Center, the central power building at Caltech, the dining facility and ancillary facilities at Camp Curry in Yosemite, the Griffith Park Girls Camp, the Santa Ana government center, the Buena Park Civic Center and the Japanese teahouse at Descanso Gardens in La Canada Flintridge.

In 1973 Smith left the firm of Smith and Williams and opened a private practice, designing the entrance complex and auditorium for the Huntington Library in San Marino, the Pasadena Neighborhood Church and the science building and the art studio and gymnasium at Westridge School for Girls in Pasadena. He retired in the mid-1980s.
Smith also taught architecture at USC and Scripps College in the 1940s and 1950s.

From latimes.com, housing.com, dwell.com

Evans house, with A. Quincy Jones
unstage.com

Alternate view of Evans house
nhit-shis.org

Schneidman house, with A. Quincy Jones
historichomesla.blogspot.com

Hamma house, with A. Quincy Jones
crosbydoe.com

Interior of Hamma house
takesunset.com

Pasadena home designed with Douglas Byles
homesbythegretchens.com

One of the original MHA homes, with A. Quincy Jones
corybuckner.com

Smith demonstrating moké (rhymes with OK), a method of weaving plywood to form intricate designs
dwell.com

Monday, September 19, 2011

Pierre Koenig's Case Study House #21 comes full circle

In 1945, architect and editor of Arts & Architecture magazine John Entenza announced the Case Study House Program, which encouraged architects to create low-cost modern housing prototypes that could be duplicated to meet the impending housing shortage after World War II. Along with architects like Richard Neutra, Craig Ellwood, Charles Eames, Eero Saarinen and Raphael Soriano, Pierre Koenig was chosen to take part in the program.

In early 1957, Dr. Walter Bailey and his wife Mary commissioned Koenig to design the 1300 square foot Case Study House 21, now popularly known as the Bailey House, in the Hollywood Hills canyon. The house was completed in 1959.

The next year, Julius Shulman was invited to photograph the home, and along with photographs of another of Koenig's designs (Case Study House #22, the Stahl House), these images became icons of California Modernism.

The Baileys relocated to the East Coast in 1969 and sold the house. Over the next thirty years, the structure suffered many alterations which destroyed much of Koenig's design. However, in 1997, film producer Dan Cracchiolo (of Matrix, Lethal Weapon and Conspiracy Theory fame) saw Shulman's photographs and bought the Bailey House. He commissioned Pierre Koenig to oversee restoration of the home to its original beauty. Of the previous alterations, Koenig said, “Even though I knew what had been going on in this house, it was a great shock to see it. My houses are like children to me.”

In addition to restoring architectural elements, Cracchiolo even commissioned replicas of some of the original furnishings from the original manufacturers, including Gerald McCabe's long Formica cabinet and the black Naugahyde sofa in the entryway, which were made famous in Shulman's photos. In 2006, Shulman, at age 95, was again invited to photograph the Bailey House.

Cracchiolo’s restoration was featured in the July 1999 issue of Architectural Digest, and in 2001, Koenig was honored with the Preservation 2000 award from the City of Los Angeles for the Bailey House restoration.

In 2000, the house was purchased by film producer and famous-house collector Michael LaFetra. Reportedly, Koenig called LaFetra and said, " “Hello, this is Pierre, your architect, and I want to talk.” LaFetra was told by Koenig that “he ought not to have to change anything in the house but, if he needed to, he should get in touch with him.” A friendship developed between the two, and Koenig designed a Malibu beach house for LaFetra, his last project.

LaFetra made sure he got the Bailey House listed as a Historic-Cultural Monument before selling it in 2002. Pierre Koenig passed away from leukemia in April 2004 at the age of 78 knowing that his work was appreciated by a new generation of architecture lovers.

From jetsetmodern.com, wikipedia.org

Shulman photo of entryway, 1960
jetsetmodern.com

Shulman photo of entryway, 2006
dailyicon.com

Famous Shulman entryway photo
pichaus.com

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt recreate
the famous Shulman entryway photo
jetsetmoderist.tumblr.com

Kitchen, 1960
jetsetmodern.com

Kitchen, 2006
dailyicon.com

Looking out kitchen into carport, 1960
wikiarquitectura.com

Looking out kitchen into carport, 2006
dailyicon.com

Living area with deck area in rear, 1960
jetsetmodern.com

Living area, looking in from deck, 2006
dailyicon.com

Exterior, 1960
jetsetmodern.com

Exterior, 2006
dailyicon.com

Pronunciation Guide

Tuesday, December 6, 2011

Case Study House #16 Redux

Craig and Bruce Walker didn't find out until a few years ago how important their father Rodney Walker was. To them, he had built some houses and made really good spaghetti. The elder Walker didn't talk much about his career. He never aspired to be an architect. Instead, he preferred to be called a designer-builder. He didn't keep records of what he had built...or where. It wasn't until 2001, when historians began to contact them for information, that they realized just how esteemed a place their father holds in the field of architecture.

Bruce, then a 58-year-old acoustical engineer, and his 52-year-old brother Craig, a secondary school teacher, decided it was time to do some detective work and find out more about their father's work. All they had to start with were memories of going to job sites with him and a few old photographs and magazine spreads.

As nearly as they were able to discover, their father built between 75 and 100 homes in Southern California. He also built a home in the San Francisco area for his sister. Three of Rodney Walker's designs were chosen for John Entenza's Case Study House program and became houses #16, #17 and #18. The brothers, who are both married and have grown children, decided to build replicas of Case Study House #16 for themselves as a tribute to their father. Bruce's home is in Camarillo, California, and Craig's is 20 miles away in Ojai, where the brothers also lived in the masterpiece residence their father built for the family in 1959.

The original Case Study House #16 was the first home Rodney Walker built for his family in 1946 at 9945 Beverly Grove Drive in Beverly Hills, California, and the brothers had visited it from time to time over the years. When they called the current owner to see if they could look at it again, they were shocked to learn that it had fallen into disrepair and had been demolished.

By chance, however, a project Rodney Walker had done in Louisville, Kentucky, came to light, and it turned out to be an identical construction of Case Study House #16. Luckily, the owner still had the plans Walker had left with her, and she was happy to share them with Walker's sons. They gave the plan, along with old photos, to an architect and a structural engineer who made slight variations to suit each brother's needs, and the two houses became a reality. Bruce and his wife Delores moved into their home in Camarillo in 2002, while Craig and his wife Debi moved into their Ojai home in 2006.

From docomomo.us.org

Original Case Study House #16
housing.progressivedisclosure.net

Exterior of Craig Walker's home in Ojai, California
artnet.com

Interior of Craig Walker's home in Ojai, California
artnet.com


Craig Walker's Ojai home traceblog.com

artsandarchitecture.com

Thursday, May 9, 2013

Saul Bass

Saul Bass (1920-1996) was an American graphic artist. Born in the Bronx to an emigré furrier and his wife, he showed an intense interest in art as a child. In 1936 he won a scholarship to study at the Art Students League in New York, after which he worked as an assistant in the New York art department of Warner Brothers. In 1944 he went to work for the Blaine Thompson Company advertising agency and enrolled in Brooklyn College, where he studied under Gyorgy Kepes, a Hungarian graphic designer who had worked with László Moholy-Nagy. Kepes introduced him to the Bauhaus style and to Russian Constructivism.

In 1946, he moved to Los Angeles, where he opened his own studio, Saul Bass Associates, in 1950. He continued working in advertising until Otto Preminger invited him to design a poster for the 1954 movie Carmen Jones. Preminger was so impressed with the poster that he asked Bass to do the film's title sequence too.

This work elicited commissions for more film titles: Robert Aldrich's The Big Knife and Billy Wilder's The Seven Year Itch, both in 1955. That same year, he did another project for Preminger, The Man with the Golden Arm, which established him as the reigning master of film title design.

Later examples of his brilliant work are Mike Todd's 1956 Around the World in 80 Days, Alfred Hitchcock's Vertigo in 1958, North by Northwest in 1959 and Psycho in 1960, as well as Preminger's Anatomy of a Murder in 1959 and Lewis Milestone's original Ocean's 11 and Stanley Kubrick's Spartacus in 1960. In 1961 he did titles for Edward Dmytryk's Walk on the Wild Side, the poster and closing credits for Jerome Robbins and Robert Wise's West Side Story, and in 1966 he worked on John Frankenheimer's Grand Prix.

During the 1970s, Bass created corporate identities for companies such as United Airlines, AT&T, Minolta, Bell Telephone System and Warner Communications. He also designed the poster for the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games.

He worked with Martin Scorsese on Goodfellas in 1990, Cape Fear in 1991, The Age of Innocence in 1993 and Casino in 1995.

Saul Bass died the next year. His New York Times obituary hailed him as "the minimalist auteur who put a jagged arm in motion in 1955 and created an entire film genre…and elevated it into an art."

Yesterday was the 93rd anniversary of Bass's birth, and the Google Doodle honored this influential artist by imagining the Google logo through his eyes. How many of the nine films that are referenced in the Doodle can you name? (Answers at the end of this post)

From designmuseum.org, csmonitor.com and slate.com

youtube.com

West Side Story poster
wikipedia.org

In 1958 architects Conrad Buff III, Donald C. Hensman and Calvin C. Straub designed Case Study House #20B, which was built for Saul Bass at 2275 Santa Rosa Ave in Altadena, California (not to be confused with #20A by Richard Neutra), as part of John Entenza's Arts & Architecture Case Study House Program.

Case Study House #20B - Bass House

grainedit.com

Case Study House #20B - Bass House

grainedit.com

Case Study House #20B - Bass House

grainedit.com

Answer to the Google Doodle quiz: Psycho, The Man with the Golden Arm, Spartacus, West Side Story, Vertigo, North by Northwest, Anatomy of a Murder, Ocean's 11, and Around the World in Eighty Days

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Thornton Abell

Thornton Montaigne Abell (1906-1984) was a California-based architect. He was born in South Haven, Michigan, and educated at the University of Michigan, the University of California Berkeley and the University of Southern California where he graduated cum laude with a degree in architecture in 1931.

He worked as a designer for Clare C. Hosmer from 1925-1926, as a designer for Joseph J. Kucera from 1926-1927 and as a designer and chief draftsman for Marsh, Smith and Powell from 1930-1942. He opened his own office in 1944.

In 1947 he was asked to participate in the Case Study House Program. He designed and built Case Study House #7, which was completed in 1949.

From 1950-1952, Abell taught architecture and design at the Chouinard Art Institute in Los Angeles, and from 1953-1965 he taught at the University of Southern California's School of Architecture.

From washington.edu and soloarquitectura.com