Orange County Modernism at Modernism Week
The folks at Palm Springs’ Modernism Week opened their big tent to Preserve Orange County during their two week festival in February. We hosted two events that highlighted the Modern architecture of Orange County. One was an hour-long series of three short lectures by architectural historians, Alan Hess, Barbara Lamprecht and Teosson Wells called, “Beyond the Orange Curtain: Modern Life, Work and Play in Orange County.” We learned that the Modern period began in Orange County in the late 1920s with a radical Newport Beach house by Rudolph Schindler. It accelerated through mid-century with the principles of master planning applied in the former ranch lands of southern Orange County, and climaxed with Post-Modernism in San Juan Capistrano in 1982.
Barbara Lamprecht on the work by Dion and Richard Neutra in Orange County, and some thoughts on how two of the first Modernist houses ever commissioned- designed by Rudolph Schindler in Newport Beach and the other by Richard Neutra in Los Angeles in the 1920s, contrast with each other.
Barbara Lamprecht began by dedicating her talk to Dion Neutra, the Los Angeles-based architect who died last November. Mr. Neutra designed the Huntington Beach public library in 1975, which she described as “Brutalism done beautifully.” She shared her work on the restoration of the Arboretum, historically known as Reverend Robert Schuller’s drive-in church, designed by Richard Neutra, Dion Neutra and Sergei Koschin in 1968 in Garden Grove, now part of the campus of the Catholic Diocese of Orange County. Among the twelve public commissions completed by Richard Neutra and his firm in the county, only six are still extant. Dr. Lamprecht also provided a comparison of the the two Lovell houses- the Newport Beach beach house designed by Rudolph Schindler in 1926 and the Los Angeles hilltop house designed by Richard Neutra in 1929. Dr. Lamprecht conceded that one could spend the afternoon comparing these two buildings, “existentially, materially, geographically…” She said the Schindler house in Orange County is “bilaterally symmetrical and monumental,” it’s a “radical, radical house.” By contrast, Neutra’s house isn’t monumental, it’s a layered construction, cantilevered and set into a hillside.
Teosson Wells has included several images from his collection of the early developments of Laguna Niguel, the master planned community in southern Orange County, in his book, Laguna Niguel, published by Arcadia in 2018.
Producer, writer and Laguna Niguel resident, Teosson Wells, shared his impressive archive of images of Laguna Niguel, including the images Ansel Adams took of the open ranch land before the Laguna Niguel Corporation began development in 1958. Mr. Wells revealed the long list of architects and artists who were associated with the early master planned community, which he said was the first of its kind in the US, beginning with international design firm, Victor Gruen and Associates and including Carlos Diniz, Thornton Ladd and John Kelsey, Knowlton Fernald and Kevin Roche.
The hour was brought to a close by Alan Hess who provided a rapid-fire overview of Orange County’s finest architecture of the Modern period, up to the Post-Modern San Juan Capistrano public library by Michael Graves (1982). To view Alan sharing his list, please go to the Architectural History section of our website by clicking here, and scroll down.
Alan Hess, introducing “Beyond the Orange Curtain: Modern Life, Work and Play in Orange County,” February 17, 2020 at the Camp Theatre, Modernism Week, Palm Springs