Midcentury modern in modern times: Pioneering homes become classics and continue to evolve

Enlarge Image

This photo provided by courtesy of The Monacelli Press shows the living room looking into the kitchen in the Celanese House, by architect, Edward Durell Stone (1957) , from the book, "Midcentury Houses Today," published by The Monacelli Press. In the years after World War II, when suburban towns were still the country, this village an hour north of Manhattan became an epicenter of Modernist architecture and a birthplace of then-radical concepts like family rooms, floor-to-ceiling windows and open-plan living. The new book looks at how 16 New Canaan homes from that influential era have continued to evolve. (AP Photo/The Monacelli Press, Michael Biondo)

NEW CANAAN, Conn. - In the years after World War II, when suburban towns were still "the country," this unassuming village an hour north of Manhattan became an epicenter of modernist architecture, and a birthplace of then-radical concepts like family rooms, floor-to-ceiling windows and open-plan living.

Since then, the surviving homes have continued to evolve, a transformation explored in a new book that looks at 16 of New Canaan's 91 remaining homes from this influential era.

"These homes were meant to be truly modern, to adapt. Preservation is about keeping the character while allowing these homes to move on," said architect Cristina A. Ross, who with architect Jeffrey Matz, photographer Michael Biondo and graphic designer Lorenzo Ottaviani produced the book, "Midcentury Houses Today" (Monacelli Press, 2014).

In New Canaan, she said, "the concentration of homes and the number of surviving houses to this day is incredibly unique."

Through photos, detailed floor plans and time lines, and the voices of architects, builders and occupants, the book traces the original structures and subsequent additions, devoting a full chapter to each home.

Unlike the modernist architecture of the Midwest, New Canaan's modernist homes directly reflect the principles of the Bauhaus school of design in Germany, established by architect Walter Gropius. When the Nazi regime closed down the Bauhaus in the 1930s, Gropius became chairman of the architecture department at the Graduate School of Design at Harvard. He was later joined by Marcel Breuer. Together, the two passed on their esthetic emphasizing volume; large areas of glass juxtaposed by blank walls; flat roofs; freedom from architectural ornamentation to students and associates.

Breuer, Eliot Noyes, Landis Gores, Philip Johnson and John Johansen, all early promulgators of modernism in New Canaan, became known as the Harvard Five. They moved to New Canaan, near the last stop on the commuter rail line and near the newly constructed Merritt Parkway. Land was cheap and plentiful enough to allow for new experiments in architecture. They were soon joined there by architects Victor Christ-Janer, John Black Lee and others.

"They were experimenting, and they were fast and furiously creating the way they felt people should be living," said Ross. "They were designing the offices for IBM, for big corporations, and people became so enamoured of the work environment that many CEOs wanted to bring that streamlining and flow to their home life."

View post:
Midcentury modern in modern times: Pioneering homes become classics and continue to evolve