USModernist Radio - Architecture You Love artwork

USModernist Radio - Architecture You Love

402 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 24 hours ago - ★★★★★ - 74 ratings

Listen to one of America's top-rated architecture podcasts as the USModernist® Radio crew talks and laughs with fascinating people who own, create, love, and hate Modernist architecture, the most controversial houses and buildings in the world.

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Episodes

#127/NY Architecture + Design Film Festival: Britni Harris on Bruce Goff + Lene Borch Hansen on Jorn Utzon

January 20, 2020 08:00 - 51 minutes - 47.7 MB

This is the third year USModernist Radio has been part of the Architecture and Design Film Festival in New York. Every fall, the stars, producers, and creators gather to premiere their latest documentaries.  ADFF Executive Director Kyle Bergman curates visually wonderful, thought-provoking, and faithfully documented films that capture the brilliance of architects, artists, and significant buildings. Host George Smart talks with two of the filmmakers from this year’s festival:  Lene Borch H...

Bonus Show #2: PJ Lefofsky, Producer of Neutra: Survival Through Design

January 16, 2020 08:00

In this bonus show, George gets locked out of Tom's studio but still manages to record and edit an interview with PJ Letofsky, producer of the documentary Neutra:  Survival Through Design.  Featuring historian Barbara Lamprecht, son Raymond Neutra, son Dion Neutra who just passed away, Norman Foster, Moshe Safdie, and of course -- Alan Hess.  Neutra's houses are still highly prized 50 to 90 years later, and his legacy of incredibly beautiful and functional design is still wildly popular.  Ge...

Bonus Show #2: PJ Letofsky, Producer of Neutra: Survival Through Design

January 16, 2020 08:00 - 26 minutes - 24.9 MB

In this bonus show, George gets locked out of Tom's studio but still manages to record and edit an interview with PJ Letofsky, producer of the documentary Neutra:  Survival Through Design.  Featuring historian Barbara Lamprecht, son Raymond Neutra, son Dion Neutra who just passed away, Norman Foster, Moshe Safdie, and of course -- Alan Hess.  Neutra's houses are still highly prized 50 to 90 years later, and his legacy of incredibly beautiful and functional design is still wildly popular.  Ge...

#126/Southwest Modern: Texas and New Mexico

January 13, 2020 08:00 - 45 minutes - 42.3 MB

Amy Walton is from Texas, where she spent 15 years managing nonprofits like the North Texas Food Bank and the Jewish Family Service. Last year, she launched modTEXAS, an initiative to draw attention to Texas modernism and celebrate the people and institutions working to preserve it. Building a coalition of over a dozen nonprofits using social media, modTEXANS have shared thousands of images of midcentury design and architecture that can literally be mapped across the state. When you think ...

#125/Bob Borson: Life of an Architect

January 06, 2020 08:00 - 40 minutes - 46.5 MB

Welcome to 2020!  In our ongoing quest to seek out other architecture podcasts, we’ve talked with hosts such as Frances Anderton, Donna Sink, Steve Chung, Josh Cooperman, David+Marina, and Debbie Millman.  Today we talk with Bob Borson, creator of the most visited privately-maintained architectural blog in the world, Life of an Architect, which as of two years ago is also a podcast. We first encountered Bob’s blog in 2012 when he put out a wonderful series of hilarious architecture Christmas...

New Year's Eve Bonus! Luca Baraldo of COOKFOX on Geller's Double Diamond + Rocky Rochon on Colors

December 31, 2019 08:00 - 29 minutes - 28.2 MB

Shhh!  George broke into Tom's studio late at night to bring you two bonus interviews from 2019. Happy new year!

#124/Almost Live from Neutra's Lovell House: Lyra Kilston + Josh Gorrell with Musical Guest Valerie Wood

December 30, 2019 08:00 - 1 hour - 70 MB

Host George Smart met today's guests at a LA party USModernist Radio threw last year at Neutra's Lovell House.  Lyra Kilston is a writer and editor focused on architecture, design, art, urbanism, with publication in The Los Angeles Review of Books, The Los Angeles Times, Next City, Artforum, Wired, TIME, Art in America, and ICON. She is an editor for the Getty Museum, a consulting editor for Hyperallergic, and her first book is Sun Seekers: The Cure of California. Josh Gorrell is a preservat...

#123/Architecture Into Comedy: Writer Ron Friedman

December 16, 2019 08:00 - 57 minutes - 66 MB

Ron Friedman graduated in architecture from Carnegie Mellon University. After working for a few years as an architect, he came to his senses and started writing and performing stand-up comedy.  He was spotted by Dean Martin and Danny Kaye which launched a career writing for countless TV and variety shows, over 700 hours of beloved prime-time TV that you know and probably love, including The Andy Griffith Show, Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie, Vegas, and Fantasy Island.  If you’re younger than ...

#122/Eliot Noyes, One of the Harvard Five: Fred Noyes

December 02, 2019 08:00 - 55 minutes - 63.7 MB

Born in Boston, architect Eliot Noyes graduated Harvard University. After working for Boston's Coolidge Shepley Bulfinch & Abbott, he left to work for Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. Awarded a Wheelwright Traveling Fellowship, he toured the US visiting Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater and Taliesin; Eliel Saarinen's Cranbrook Academy of Art; and Richard Neutra houses.  After returning briefly to Gropius and Breuer, he became the first director of the Industrial Design Department at the Mus...

#121/The Incredible TWA Hotel at JFK: with Eric Saarinen + Architects Richard Southwick, Anne Marie Lubrano + Lea Ciaverra

November 25, 2019 08:00 - 1 hour - 88.4 MB

There’s a building at JFK airport in New York that people have been talking about for almost 60 years.  At one time, it was the world's most modern airport terminal, bringing the Jet Age fully into public consciousness.  This building had no peer; and its creator, Eero Saarinen, was one of the most visionary architects in the world. For years the airline TWA (later absorbed by American Airlines) used it as a glamorous gateway to the world, sending off passengers in an era people dressed up t...

#120/DWELL: Editor William Hanley

November 18, 2019 08:00 - 35 minutes - 46.8 MB

Any fan of Modernism has DWELL Magazine somewhere in their house.  It’s a venerable but relatively recent publication, started in 2000 by Lara Hedberg Deam in San Francisco.  She’s still the owner, and like a winning NFL coach, she’s been stocking the team over nearly 20 years with winning players like Karrie Jacobs, Michela O'Connor Abrams, Amanda Dameron, and former podcast guest Alison Arieff.  With a motto of “at home in the Modern World,” DWELL helped re-energize a terrazzo (that’s ou...

#119/Living in Philip Johnson with Cristina Ross and Inger Stringfellow

November 11, 2019 08:00 - 38 minutes - 44.6 MB

In the lovely town of New Canaan CT, from the 1940s through the 1990s, no one was more influential than architect Philip Johnson. His internationally-famous Glass House celebrated its 70th anniversary recently with a huge outdoor party and aerial performance by Philippe Petit, known for his daring and highly unauthorized wirewalk between the World Trade Center towers pre-2001. New Canaan is full of mid-century Modernist architecture from Johnson, Eliot Noyes, Marcel Breuer, John Hedjuk, and ...

#118/The (Next to) Last Frank Lloyd Wright Client: Roland Reisley

November 04, 2019 08:00 - 40 minutes - 46.3 MB

Frank Lloyd Wright, now 60 years after his death, remains the most well-known architect in America, perhaps the world.  Notorious for his ego, which was matched only by his genius and talent, Wright would be delighted to be so this famous for so long.  Wright would say, and he did, that he was the greatest architect ever, and for many, he was and still is.  Roland Reisley was only 26 when he became Wright’s client for a small house.  Now Reisley is one of Wright's last living clients, stil...

#118/The Last Frank Lloyd Wright Client: Roland Reisley

November 04, 2019 08:00 - 46.3 MB

Frank Lloyd Wright, now 60 years after his death, remains the most well-known architect in America, perhaps the world.  Notorious for his ego, which was matched only by his genius and talent, Wright would be delighted to be so this famous for so long.  Wright would say, and he did, that he was the greatest architect ever, and for many, he was and still is.  Roland Reisley was only 26 when he became Wright’s client for a small house.  Now Reisley is Wright's last living client still in the ...

#117/Serial Modernist: Lord Peter Palumbo

October 21, 2019 07:00 - 43 minutes - 40.1 MB

Lord Peter Palumbo is a developer, art collector, car collector, wine collector, architecture collector and Conservative life peer based in the UK. He was educated at Eton and Worcester College, Oxford, a star athlete who played polo with Prince Charles. He first met Mies van her Rohe in the 1960’s and spent much of the next 30 years trying to get one of his buildings built. In 1972, he purchased the Farnsworth House by Mies van der Rohe in Plano, Illinois and in 1986 he bought Frank Lloyd W...

#116/John Lautner A-Z: Tycho Saariste + Jan-Richard Kikkert

October 07, 2019 07:00 - 46 minutes - 43.3 MB

Architect John Lautner of Los Angeles was incredibly ahead of his time. Over 50 years, Lautner blurred the boundaries between indoor and outdoor spaces, between nature and architecture.  He carried out 144 of his designs, 103 of which are still standing, mostly around Los Angeles, and all highly prized. Two architects in the Netherlands set out to personally discover not just a few of his projects - but ALL of them. Jan-Richard Kikkert and Tycho Saariste's new book, Lautner A-Z, has dedicati...

#115/The Ferris Bueller House: Meghann Salamasick

September 23, 2019 07:00 - 39 minutes - 36.7 MB

One of the best 80s films is, the envelope please, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Here's the plot: near the end of the school year, high school senior Ferris Bueller (played by Matthew Broderick) fakes being sick to stay home. His parents believe him, though his sister Jeanie (played by Jennifer Grey, the baby you don’t back into a corner) is not convinced. Ferris persuades his best friend Cameron (Alan Ruck) to help lure Ferris' girlfriend (Mia Sara) out of school and let them use his father's p...

#114/Architecture Photographer Ezra Stoller: Pierluigi Serraino + Erica Stoller

September 09, 2019 07:00 - 40 minutes - 38.1 MB

Returning podcast guest Pierluigi Serraino is an architect and author whose book Modernism Rediscovered contributed to the huge re-emergence of interest in the architecture we all know and love.  He has written books on Eero Saarinen, NorCalMod: Icons of Northern California Modernism, California Captured with past podcast guests Emily Bills and Sam Lubell, and his newest book co-authored with Erica Stoller, Ezra Stoller: A Photographic History of Modern American Architecture. Erica Stoller...

#113/Modernism is Bad, Really Bad: Professor James Stevens Curl

August 26, 2019 07:00 - 47 minutes - 44.3 MB

A graduate in Architecture from Oxford, Professor James Stevens Curl is known for scholarship, penetrating criticisms, lucidity of style, and holding his nose at the stench of Modernism, of which he is definitely not a fan.  He’s probably rather be down at the Groaning Board hoisting a pint, but we’re thrilled to have him talk about his new award-winning book, Making Dystopia: The Strange Rise and Survival of Architectural Barbarism, in which he takes apart the Modernist movement piece by pi...

#112/Design Podcasters Stephen Chung + Donna Sink

August 19, 2019 07:00 - 41 minutes - 38.7 MB

Over the last few year, we’ve been checking out design and architecture podcasts from around America.  We've had Frances Anderton of DnA, Debbie Millman of Design Matters, Josh Cooperman of Convo by Design, and David and Marina of Midnight Charrette.  Today we welcome two new friends who keep the public's design fire going with their interesting and popular podcasts.  Architect Steve Chung is based in Boston, where the good clam chowder lives, focused on residential and hospitality project...

#111/Modernism's Three Amigos: Architects Tom Kundig + Frank Harmon + Marlon Blackwell

August 12, 2019 07:00 - 46 minutes - 42.9 MB

Three Amigos: Tom Kundig, Frank Harmon, and Marlon Blackwell.  Not only are they the best of friends but they are award-winning rockstars of Modernist residential architecture.   Tom Kundig is principal with Olson Kundig Architects and came to national attention with 1998’s Studio House and in 2002, the Chicken Point Cabin.  Tom’s honors include the Cooper Hewitt 2008 National Design Award, eleven national AIA design awards, too many Washington AIA awards to count, and over 450 feature ar...

#110/Modernism Week Wrapup: Paul Rudolph at 100 with Christopher Wilson + Dick Burkett

August 05, 2019 07:00 - 28 minutes - 26.2 MB

Today we wrap up coverage of Modernism Week 2019 by honoring architect Paul Rudolph. 2018 was the 100th anniversary of architect Paul Rudolph's birth and his work lives on to even high acclaim than when he was alive.  Rudolph got on the national radar through innovative Modernist houses in Sarasota, Florida.  Later he created masterworks in concrete and steel in New York, New England, and late in his career Singapore and Hong Kong. Host George Smart talks to two big Rudolph fans, returning g...

#109/Not a Modernist: Justin Shubow of the National Civic Art Society

July 29, 2019 07:00 - 48 minutes - 45.1 MB

Today we welcome back Justin Shubow, President of the National Civic Art Society, a non-profit dedicated to promoting the classical tradition in public art and architecture. President Trump appointed him in 2018 to the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, a federal agency which oversees the design and construction of government buildings and memorials in Washington DC. Shubow is the author of The Gehry Towers over Eisenhower, a 150-page critique of the Eisenhower Memorial, a battle he sort of won, ...

#108/Modernism Week Documentaries: Dion Neutra + Devon Chivvis

July 22, 2019 07:00 - 49 minutes - 45.8 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February. It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry. Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! Architecture documentaries visually capture the spirit and stories of great Modernist buildings in ways not possible through books ...

#107/New York's Josh Ramus

July 15, 2019 07:00 - 49 minutes - 45.6 MB

In an interview recorded at REX in Brooklyn, New York, George Smart sat down with architect Josh Ramus. The Huffington Post named him one of the five greatest architects under 50. Wallpaper Magazine described him as one of the world's most influential young architects. Esquire Magazine dubbed him the young saviour of American architecture. Icon Magazine called him one of the 20 Essential Young Architects. And Popular Mechanics said “Josh who? Is he that cold fusion guy?” Graduating from H...

#106/Modernism Week Celebrity: Alan Hess + Michael Stern + Lindsay Blake

July 08, 2019 07:00 - 46 minutes - 43 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February. It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry. Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! Authors Michael Stern and Alan Hess join us poolside at the swanky Hotel Skylark to discuss their new book: Hollywood Modern: Hous...

#105/Minoru Yamasaki, Forgotten Architect of the Twin Towers: Author Dale Gyure

July 01, 2019 07:00 - 57 minutes - 52.8 MB

Despite enormous success, architect Minoru Yamasaki’s reputation declined in the 1970's with the negative public reception of the World Trade Center in New York and the spectacular failure of St. Louis’s Pruitt-Igoe public housing project. Author Dale Gyure is associate chair and professor of Architecture at Lawrence Technological University. His most recent book, Minoru Yamasaki: Humanist Architecture for a Modernist World, is the first to closely examine Yamasaki's work and life.

#105/Minoru Yamazaki, Forgotten Architect of the Twin Towers: Author Dale Gyure

July 01, 2019 07:00 - 52.8 MB

Despite enormous success, architect Minoru Yamasaki’s reputation declined in the 1970's with the negative public reception of the World Trade Center in New York and the spectacular failure of St. Louis’s Pruitt-Igoe public housing project. Author Dale Gyure is associate chair and professor of Architecture at Lawrence Technological University. His most recent book, Minoru Yamasaki: Humanist Architecture for a Modernist World, is the first to closely examine Yamasaki's work and life.

#104/Modernism Week Photography: Emily Bills + Pierluigi Serraino, plus Andrew Pielage

June 24, 2019 07:00 - 45 minutes - 52.3 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February.  It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry.  Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! The photographers documenting the mid-century movement provide us a wealth of information, perspective, and enjoyment, capturing ...

#103/Children Of Genius: Charlee Deaton + Musical Guests the Luca Colonna Trio

June 17, 2019 07:00 - 35 minutes - 33 MB

If you’ve been listening closely, you know our special series called Children of Genius, featuring Susan Saarinen, daughter of Eero Saarinen, Raymond Neutra, son of Richard Neutra, Emily Ain, daughter of Gregory Ain, and Randy Koenig, son of Pierre Koenig. Today we're thrilled to talk with Charlee Deaton, daughter of architect Charles Deaton. You can also see it from the nearby Interstate. The Sleeper House got world-famous through the Woody Allen movie of the same name in 1973.  Deaton’s ...

#102/Modernism Week Design: Joel Turkel + Anthony Poon + Jacques Caussin

June 10, 2019 07:00 - 1 hour - 59.3 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February.  It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry.  Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! Today USModernist welcomes two California architects building new Modernist houses and one expert sharing how Modernism started: ...

#101/Debbie Millman, Host of Design Matters

June 03, 2019 07:00 - 50 minutes - 58.5 MB

Debbie Millman is the founder and host of the pioneering, award-winning, long-running, and successful podcast, Design Matters. Going into her 14th year, Millman has interviewed over 400 designers, artists, and others in the creative culture such as Milton Glaser, Malcolm Gladwell, Barbara Kruger, Massimo Vignelli, Marina Abramovic, Thomas Kail, Laurie Anderson, Shepard Fairey, and Steven Heller. She’s a polymath of designer, artist, writer, educator, curator, speaker, and CEO.  Design Matter...

#100/Modernism Week Books: Authors Melissa Riche and Adele Cygelman

May 27, 2019 07:00 - 39 minutes - 36.9 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February.  It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry.  Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! You remember books, right?  Those things we had in our hands to read before Kindle? George and Tom welcome author Adele Cygelman,...

#99/Chef and The Farmer: Vivian Howard + Ben Knight + Co-host Rebekah Laney

May 20, 2019 07:00 - 48 minutes - 55.9 MB

Kinston is about as typical Eastern North Carolina as you can get.  They have lots of barbeque, a minor league baseball team that’s pretty good, they support what’s left of the tobacco industry, and they keep up the CSS Neuse, one of the last Confederate ironclad ships, although Donald Trump is considering restoring it to attack Canada.  Kinston never had a really great restaurant, but that changed when chef Vivian Howard and artist Ben Knight came to town in 2006 from New York and opened ...

#98/Modernism Week Music! With AJ Lambert + The Gand Band

May 13, 2019 07:00 - 50 minutes - 57.9 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February.  It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry.  Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! Music is an important part of Modernism Week.  Host George Smart talks with singer-songwriter AJ Lambert, who just released a deb...

#97/Midnight Charrette: Marina Bourderonnet + David Lee

May 06, 2019 07:00 - 45 minutes - 52.4 MB

Over the last few months, we’ve been checking out fellow design and architecture podcasts from around America.  We've had Frances Anderton of DnA and Josh Cooperman of Convo by Design – and today we’re excited to welcome the hosts of Midnight Charrette.   Co-host Marina Bourderonnet (bor-dare-ro-nay) grew up in France, training at the Ecole Nationale Superieure d'Architecture with a Bachelor of Architecture degree.  She speaks four languages and loves, we recently learned, suspenders. Co...

#96/Modernism Week 2019: Christine Madrid French + Amy Jarvis + Ken Topper

April 29, 2019 07:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February.  It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry.  Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! Today George talks with author and longtime Modernist researcher Christine Madrid French, who with Marty Hylton did the first com...

#95/Phillip Johnson, The Man in the Glass House: Author Mark Lamster

April 22, 2019 07:00 - 50 minutes - 58.5 MB

Architect Philip Johnson’s father invested 100 years ago in ALCOA, the huge aluminum company, which Johnson a millionaire in his '20s. Before he became an architect, however, Johnson organized a landmark exhibition on International Style at the Museum of Modern Art in 1932 which introduced important Modernist architects as Le Corbusier, Walter Gropius, and Mies van der Rohe. He went on to get formal education in design but by then his reputation as a kingmaker of architects was firmly establ...

#94/Modernism Week 2019: Annalisa Capurro + Peter Moruzzi + Chris Mobley

April 15, 2019 07:00 - 54 minutes - 62.7 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February.  It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry.  Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! Today from poolside at the swanky Hotel Skylark, George Smart welcomes one of the show's favorite guests - it's Ms. Modernism, An...

#93/Modernist House Museums: The VDL House and The Glass House

April 08, 2019 07:00 - 40 minutes - 47.2 MB

Today host George Smart and special guest cohost Kate Wagner of McMansion Hell dives into two Modernist house museums by internationally famous architects: Richard Neutra’s VDL house in LA and Philip Johnson’s Glass house in New Canaan CT. Richard Neutra became one of the most important architects in the world. In fact, Time Magazine featured Neutra on its cover and ranked him second only to Frank Lloyd Wright. Our first guest is Sarah Lorenzen, Director of the Neutra's VDL house in Los An...

#92/Modernism Week 2019: Remembering Craig Ellwood with Erin Ellwood, Jim Tyler, Barton Jahncke, Maria Demopoulos

April 01, 2019 07:00 - 32 minutes - 37.2 MB

Palm Springs has a huge architecture event called Modernism Week every February.  It’s a fascinating array of architecture, lectures, parties, tours, exhibits, and the occasional plastic surgery gone awry.  Host George Smart was there earlier this year talking with nearly all the speakers, authors, and special guests who make the week (actually 11 days) a blast! Craig Ellwood was one of the most exciting people in American architecture. He took Los Angeles by storm and no one since has ful...

#91/AIA New York Cocktails + Conversation / The Martini Whisperer

March 25, 2019 07:00 - 54 minutes - 62.7 MB

New York City architects Abby Suckle and William Singer are the authors of Cocktails and Conversations: Dialogues in Architectural Design.  AIA New York’s Center for Architecture has a great Friday night format:  invite people to to hear a famous architect paired with a master bartender who creates a custom cocktail to share with a thirsty audience.  Architects have included David Adjaye, Jeanne Gang, Peter Gluck, Frank Harmon, Tom Kundig, Daniel Libeskind, Eric Owen Moss, Billie Tsien, and ...

#90/Modernism Week 2019: Architect Moshe Safdie

March 18, 2019 07:00 - 25 minutes - 29.4 MB

Today we kick off Modernism Week coverage with internationally known architect Moshe (mo-shay) Safdie. He’s been famous for over 50 years for many brilliant buildings; first as architect for Habitat 67 in Montreal, in the 2000’s as architect for the Marina Bay Sands, that crazy rich Singapore hotel featured in the movie Crazy rich Asians; and for a special small chapel you might not know about. Safdie won the 2019 Wolf Prize in Architecture and his other honors include the AIA Gold Medal, Ca...

#89/Los Angeles: Architect Barbara Bestor

March 11, 2019 07:00 - 48 minutes - 55.8 MB

USModernist has documented thousands of mid-century modernist houses, especially in Los Angeles.  One name that kept popping up when those mid-century moderns needed renovation is Los Angeles architect Barbara Bestor. She’s referred to as the unofficial Mayor of Silver Lake, an area full of great Modernist houses. She also has a robust commercial practice, including the Beats Electronics Headquarters, the Nasty Gal Headquarters, Intelligentsia Coffee & Tea, Ashes + Diamonds Winery and Even...

#88/My Grandfather, Mies: Dirk Lohan

February 25, 2019 08:00 - 47 minutes - 55.1 MB

Most people refer to architect Mies van der Rohe as Mies, which puts him into that rare club of people known by their first names, like Cher or Sting or Wynonna.  Born in Germany, Mies was into totally architect Adolf Loos -- who famously declared that ornament is a crime and pursued unadorned Modernist design to represent the new era of technology and production. Mies got worldwide attention with two projects, the Barcelona Pavilion and the Villa Tugenhat. He joined the avant-garde Bauhaus ...

#87/FLW's David Wright House in Phoenix: Victor Sidy + Alison King

February 11, 2019 08:00 - 48 minutes - 55.7 MB

Architect Victor Sidy was Dean of the Frank Lloyd Wright School of Architecture at Taliesin with campuses in Scottsdale, Arizona and Spring Green, Wisconsin. He was a vocal advocate for saving Frank Lloyd Wright houses and buildings and for walkable community development.  In 2015 he returned to private practice but is still involved with one special Frank Lloyd Wright house in Phoenix, the David and Gladys Wright House, which father Frank designed for his son. The house has been on a roller...

#86/Phoenix Modern: Will Bruder

January 28, 2019 08:00 - 55 minutes - 64.5 MB

USModernist took 25 fans of the podcast to tour Phoenix, Arizona last November. Phoenix is the home of the Chimichanga, which Tucson disputes, but more importantly for us, the city is home to some really great Modernist architecture.  We saw the Musical Instrument Museum, Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin West, Paulo Soleri’s Cosanti and Arcosanti, Wright’s First Christian Church, and the David and Gladys Wright House, among many other amazing buildings.  One of these was Phoenix Central Libra...

#85/Cape Cod Modern: Peter McMahon

January 21, 2019 08:00 - 41 minutes - 47.5 MB

Ah, Cape Cod, the arm-shaped stretch of Massachusetts where Boston goes in the summer.  The sun.  The ocean.  The traffic.  The clam chowder.  The summer theatre productions.  And best of all, except for perhaps the clam chowder, the modern architecture by Marcel Breuer, Walter Gropius, and others. There are more than 100 modernist houses representing a little-known treasure map of residential architecture.  Our guest Peter McMahon is Principal of PM Design.  Peter curated an exhibition on C...

#84/Architecture + Design Film Festival 2: Gehry Piano Frey with Guilfoyle Clemence Hess

January 07, 2019 08:00 - 59 minutes - 68.4 MB

Every fall, the New York Architecture and Design Film Festival (ADFF) premieres the best new documentaries of the year. Host George Smart was on the scene talking with the people behind the new movies. Ultan Guilfoyle’s award-winning films have been shown on PBS and HBO in the US and the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 in the UK. He is author of two books about design, and with Sydney Pollack, Guilfoyle produced Sketches of Frank Gehry. His latest film is Frank Gehry: Building Justice where archite...

#83/Modernist Realtor Preservationists: Martie Lieberman + Chris Menrad

December 31, 2018 08:00 - 41 minutes - 48.2 MB

We love realtors, and we also know many who would rather tear mid-century Modernist houses down than find new caring owners. That's ok, because there are realtors like today's guests who are passionate advocates for Modernist houses and go the extra mile. Martie Lieberman is a real estate agent with fans all over the world for mid-century modern and unique architectural houses. Martie was the force behind a resurgence of interest in the preservation of modern houses in Sarasota, Florida, a...

Books

The Glass House
2 Episodes