This is a multi-city bus tour that will take you from one end of Orange County to the other. You’ll disembark to view several now historic buildings by the Los Angeles-based architecture firm of William Pereira & Associates. Your guides are Preserve Orange County historians who will share their fresh research with you.
TICKETS
Tickets and more detail about the tour are available on our Eventbrite page. Current members of Preserve Orange County pay just $70 for a full day tour that includes a gourmet box lunch! If you aren't a member yet, you can join on our Join page.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND?
Anyone who likes historic architecture, especially from the Modern period of the mid- to late 20th century would enjoy this tour. In California, the Pereira firm designed a variety of buildings (tall buildings, university campuses, churches, libraries, civic centers) in a variety of styles (International, Brutalist, and Late Modern), and was known for producing exuberant expressions in concrete. Pereira’s most recognized buildings are probably the Geisel Library at the University of California San Diego and the Transamerica building in San Francisco but the 7 sites on this tour are also exemplars of the era and the firm’s design creativity and planning expertise.
WHY SHOULD I BE INTERESTED IN WILLIAM PEREIRA & ASSOCIATES?
Like Welton Beckett & Associates and A.C. Martin, Pereira & Associates was a large, full-service firm that catered to corporate and institutional clients. As Southern California’s population and built environment expanded dramatically after the Second World War, so did the need for architecture and planning services, mostly based in Los Angeles. With historical perspective - many of these buildings are now over 50 years old - and as this era’s buildings get replaced by new construction (the high profile Los Angeles County Museum of Art but also Pereira’s earliest International style corporate campuses in OC), William Pereira and the architects he worked with such as Gin Wong have received more attention in recent years. Thanks to articles like this one, by architect and historian Alan Hess, we now appreciate the buildings and corporate campuses as important artifacts of the era: “Erasing Pereira,” Orange Coast Magazine, June 2014.
“Planner William Pereira,” cover of Time magazine, September 6, 1963. This issue brought national attention to the master plans that Pereira & Associates were developing for the Irvine Company and the University of California, Irvine.
Selection of Pereira Buildings in Orange County-- Demolished or Not on the Tour
Top row, left to right: Chrysler Sales and Service Training Center, Anaheim. Demolished. Julius Shulman, 1959/ Ford Aeroneutronics, Newport Beach. Demolished. Julius Shulman, 1960/ AstroPower Inc., Irvine. Demolished. Julius Shulman, 1962/
Second row, left to right: Los Angeles Times Facility, Costa Mesa, CA. Julius Shulman, 1968/ Huntington Pacific Apartment Community, Huntington Beach, CA. Julius Shulman, 1968/ Buena Park Library, Buena Park, CA. Julius Shulman, 1969.
Third row, left to right: Chapman College Science Center, Orange, CA. Wayne Thom, 1970/ Laguna Playhouse, Laguna Beach, CA. Altered. Wayne Thom, 1970/ Art School, UC Irvine, Irvine, CA. Julius Shulman, 1971.
Fourth row, left to right: Harbor Municipal Court, Costa Mesa, CA. Julius Shulman, 1975/ Cypress Library and Civic Center, Cypress, CA. Krista Nicholds, 2021.