Design & Desire in the Twentieth Century

Los Angeles art director and photographer Marc Shur has posted a stunning set of outdoor advertising signs that date from about the Forties through the Sixties on his Flckr set. The photo here shows a sign that incorporates a clock, located on Ventura Boulevard in Encino, California, and is just one of a collection of dozens of photos of outstanding retro signs you can spend the better part of a hour or so enjoying.

Marc Shur, Time to Buy (2012). Copyright: Marc Shur.

Calling all (would-be) architects and Legos fanatics! Have you ever dreamed of building your own mid-century modern home inspired by the California homes of Richard Neutra or John Lautner? Well here’s your chance to enter Dwell Magazine’s Lego Modern Home Design Contest. Details can be found here. But hurry, you only have until March 29, 2012 to submit.

Live voting on entries will begin on March 31. The winner will be chosen from five finalists whose work will be on display at this year’s Dwell on Design, June 22-24, 2012.

Good luck!

“California Design, 1930-1965: Living in a Modern Way” is on exhibit now through June 3, 2012 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. This exhibit features more than 300 items including furniture, ceramics, metalwork, fashion and textiles, as well as industrial and graphic design. It is the first major show to examine the influence of California designers on mid-Twentieth century product design.

Christopher Hawthorne in his review of  “California Design” writes:

“California modernism was a distinct style from its earliest years. It traded the social conscience of the Bauhaus for an approach to design that was not only ‘looser, warmer’ and often ‘ad hoc,’ as Kaplan puts it in the catalog, and more expressive of local character, but also entirely comfortable with the notion of salesmanship and the realities of commerce. Indeed, of the exhibition’s four thematic sections, the one on ‘Selling California Modern’ arguably makes up the heart of the show. The other sections are ‘Shaping,’ on the early years of California modernism; ‘Making,’ on materials and fabrication; and ‘Living,’ on housing, furnishings and the indoor-outdoor postwar aesthetic made possible by a benign climate.” Read the entire review.

More information on “California Design, 1930-1965: Living in a Modern Way” on the LACMA site.

Read our past post on photographer Julius Schulman and California architecture.

Julius Shulman (1910–2009), photographer, Pierre Koenig, architect, Stahl House (Case Study House #22), Los Angeles, 1960 © J. Paul Getty Trust. Used with permission. Julius Shulman Photography Archive, Research Library, Getty Research Institute (2004.R.10).
Source: http://www.lacma.org/sites/default/files/imagecache/Exhibition_Main/image/Shulman.jpg

Design and Desire has featured the legendary architect Frank Lloyd Wright and his work several times. Today, however, we’re highlighting a Hollywood Hills home designed by his son, California architect Lloyd Wright.

Built in 1928 for Louis Samuel, personal secretary and companion to silent film star Ramon Navarro, the building has served as home for other notable celebrities. According to an article on msnbc.com, “Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins, Betty Comden, and Adolph Green rented the home while they worked on the Broadway musical ‘On the Town.’” Actresses Dianne Keaton and Christina Ricci and record producer  John Carter were all former owners of the property.

The house, which prominently features Lloyd Wright’s signature Mayan influences, is currently on the market for $4.195 million. Read more details.

Lloyd Wright, Samuel-Navarro House (1928), Hollywood, CA.
Source: http://m.static.newsvine.com/servista/imagesizer?file=null-nullAEA59085-C8DD-62CD-5712-26FBD50A2AA6.jpg&width=500

Design and Desire is very excited to learn from SFGate.com, the San Francisco Chronicle’s Web site, that the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences is collaborating with the Los Angeles County Museum of Art on the development of a museum dedicated to film making. The article states that while there is no definite timeline, it is hoped that the project could be completed within three to five years. A former May Company department store building located on Wilshire Boulevard is slated to become home for the new museum. Read the entire story on SFGate.

Keep following Design and Desire; we’ll post any updates on the museum’s progress as we find them.

Albert C. Martin & S.A. Marx, May Company Department Store Building, Los Angeles (1939). Photo credit: Anne Cusack (AP)
Source: http://imgs.sfgate.com/c/pictures/2011/10/07/dd-MovieMuseum07_0504296407_part6.jpg

“Kaufmann House” photographed by Julius Shulman (1947) from VISUAL ACOUSTICS, an Arthouse Films release 2009. Copyright J. Paul Getty Trust.
Source: http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/uponsun/assets_c/2010/03/4KaufmannHouse-thumb-500x396.jpg

Eric Bricker’s documentary, “Visual Acoustics: the Modernism of Julius Shulman,” covers the importance of Shulman and his photography during the development of Modern Architecture in the United States during the Twentieth Century. Five points discussed in the film:

1. Julius Shulman was not only instrumental in recording the development of Modern Architecture in the United States, but his vision also influenced how people the world over perceived those buildings. He created iconic images of the most important buildings of Richard Neutra, Rudolf Schindler and Frank Lloyd Wright, among many others.
   
   
   Photographer Julius Shulman (left) with Richard Neutra circa 1950.
   Source: http://www.trianglemodernisthouses.com/neutra306.jpg
   
   
2. Through the publication of his photographs Shulman became a “tastemaker,” introducing the public to rising architectural stars.  John Lautner, Albert Frey, Pierre Koenig, Harwell Harris, Oscar Niemeyer, Abraham Zabludovsky and E. Stewart Williams were several of the architects whose reputations Shulman helped to establish. In bonus material on the “Visual Acoustics” DVD Frank Gehry admits that while Shulman was unsuccessful in getting photographs of the architect’s early work published, the photographer did find Gehry his first client.
3. Shulman’s work “introduced an innovative lifestyle to the post-war public”(1). For each person who had the opportunity to visit one of these elegant private homes there may have been another 10,000 or more who saw Shulman’s photo of it in a magazine.
   
   
   “Case Study House #22 - Two Girls” photographed by Julius Shulman (1960). Copyright J. Paul Getty Trust.
   Source: http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/uponsun/assets_c/2010/03/1CSHTwoGirls-thumb-300x371.jpg
   

Read More

From our friend photographer David Thompson, a stunning interior shot of the Grand Lobby of Oakland’s Paramount Theatre. One almost expects to see Busby Berkeley’s dancers tap dancing in front of its fabulous facade. For more, see the entire post at Art-Deco Buildings.

Gerald Fitzgerald. Oakland Theatre, Grand Lobby (1931).
Architect: Timothy L. Pflueger
Source: http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4148/5007303571_277df0e109.jpg