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Thank you Moby!

Your eloquent anecdote summarized perfectly my own dilemma. How can my blog represent the core values of modernism and minimalism expressed by Mies van der Rohe (or Corbusier as you mentioned, or the Bauhaus, etc.) while promoting the more sculptural and less rational designs? I love rectangles, yet I also love the fantastical sculptural architecture of John Lautner, Frank Gehry, and Santiago Calatrava (just to name a few).

I still prefer large structural gestures with clean surfaces (example Disney Concert Hall), versus fussy little details (like Victorian). I see clearly that being an enthusiastic proponent is desirable, while being fanatically single minded is poor form (forgive the pun). So in summary…”Well said,” mate!

mobylosangelesarchitecture:

so, sunday i was driving home and i happened to pass by a castle for sale.
what made this especially great:

it was a block away from the soul-sucking sunset strip.

it had a hand drawn ‘for sale by owner’ sign taped to the gate out front.

it’s a really nice quasi-castle.

it overlooks a frank lloyd wright house.

see, years ago i was a committed architectural modernist. i loathed ornamentation, and i thought that year-zero for architecture began with corbusier.
anything ornamented or traditional or non-rectilinear was kind of loathsome to me, as i was a true believer in modernism.
and now?
well, life is short and i’ve come to view extremism (on my part and anyone else’s) with suspicion and distaste.
the extremist (whether religious or musical or architectural or political etc etc) usually is saying a lot more about themselves and their unresolved issues than they are about the object of their allegiance.
which leads us to wacky for-sale castles a block away from the sunset strip.
it’s ornamented, it’s traditional, and it’s amazing.
a modern house that looks like an l.a interpretation of an 18th century fantasy castle from the rhone valley.
or 17th century.
or 16th.
i have no idea.
except that whoever ends up living there is probably going to be pretty happy to jump around in the pool in the shadow of
their quasi-castle.