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| Photo: Scott Frances / Architectural Digest |
Oscar Niemeyer was a Brazilian modernist legend
responsible for important designs in Brazil such as the Museum of Modern Art in
Rio State and the capital city of Brasília. He has built only one residential
structure in the United States, where he was long banned because of his leftist
political associations. The whole project was built without his presence but
very carefully supervised by him. Despite his global fame, the Santa Monica
house he designed in 1963 for the film director Joe Strick was hardly known
even to Southern California’s Nikon-strapped aficionate of midcentury
modernism. |
| Photo: Scott Frances / Architectural Digest |
Sited on a bluff overlooking a golf course
and the Santa Monica Mountains, the expansive one-story house, with a
14-foot-tall glass-walled living room, gradually became destabilized by seismic
waves and it shifts in land values. Several years ago a developer bought the 4,600-square-foot
house, planning to raze it to build one twice the size. The application for a
demolition permit finally triggered the attention of the landmarks commission,
which issued a stay of execution, putting the preservation community on alert.
Michael and Gabrielle Boyd heard about the
endangered house the day they were closing on the sale of their town house in
Manhattan. Michael Boyd was on the plane the next day to safe the now landmark
house.
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| Photo: Scott Frances / Architectural Digest |
The architect died in 2012 by the age of 104.
Niemeyer was still practicing in Rio months before his death.
Source: Architectural Digest
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