Elizabeth makes her case

Bluprints is on top of the very large Taschen CSH book.
ISBN 3822864129. They have also published the book
in an inexpensive condensed edition,

A first-class study of the background to the Case Study Houses project created by the Southern Californian Arts & Architecture magazine. This book was originally published in conjunction with an exhibition of the program at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, in 1989-1990. It has plenty of photos and plans (though some of the photos are just a little too dark) to illustrate the eight main essays. Editor Elizabeth Smith and Amelia Jones devote forty-two pages to the actual houses with succinct descriptions, plans and photos. The rest of this marvellous book has a huge amount of information relating to housing and the post-war environment and how the thirty-six prototype houses had a wide influence on the domestic architecture that followed.

I particularly enjoyed the two essays by Thomas Hine and also Dolores Hayden's essay: 'Model Houses for the Millions: architects' dreams, builders' boasts, residents' dilemmas'. The back of the book has six contemporary architects' ideas and plans for housing in 'Extending the Case Study Concept', followed by biographies, chronology, bibliography and index.

Was the project worth it? Architectural writer Esther McCoy summed it up as... `Perceived as a prototype that was to be enacted on a mass scale, the Case Study House program was a failure. Perceived as a prophetic statement, however, as a demonstration of trends and influences that would in one way or another achieve realisation, the program must be judged a success. Perceived as art, finally, an approach suggested by their presence in The Museum of Contemporary Art, the Case Study Houses have won the right to be recognised and respected in the history of American design'.

You might think that everything about the CSH was included in this book but Elizabeth Smith has just edited another one called (you guessed it) Case Study Houses (Taschen Jumbo ISBN 3822864129) a beautiful, very expensive, so worth searching around the net, and very heavy (twelve pounds) very big (opens up to over thirty-two inches wide) 440 page visual history with hundreds of photos, especially from Julius Shulman, plans and drawings. What was missing from this sumptuous volume was all the background information in Blueprints for Modern Living, so if you go for both books, you really will have the COMPLETE CSH experience.

US

Blueprints for Modern Living: History and Legacy of the Case Study Houses: Smith, Elizabeth A. T.: 9780262692137: Amazon.com: Books
UK
Blueprints for Modern Living – History & Legacy of the Case Study Houses: History and Legacy of the Case Study Houses: Amazon.co.uk: Smith, Elizabeth: 9780262692137: Books