![]() That’s when of-the-moment designer Jean-Michel Frank imagined the interiors of a penthouse apartment on Russian Hill for Templeton Crocker. In his foreword, Goss notes that the groundwork for locals’ fascination with avant-garde decor was likely laid in 1927. According to the book, this apartment on San Francisco’s Russian Hill, designed by Michael Taylor in 1974, incorporate “natural materials, Asian accessories, overscale furniture, and a pale palette - hallmarks of what would come to be known as the California Look.”Īs the book captivatingly chronicles, this is the period during which the look developed, with San Francisco serving as a hotbed of cutting-edge design and architecture. Meza, with a foreword by scholar and curator Jared Goss, it features images and commentary by Lyon - now in his 98th year - who shot all the photographs in it for magazines like House & Garden and Vogue from the 1940s through the ’80s. The aesthetic that this symbiosis between clients and creators helped define is celebrated in the new Rizzoli book Inventing the California Look: Interiors by Frances Elkins, Michael Taylor, John Dickinson, and Other Design Innovators. Nor were they averse, on occasion, to filling a modernist house with antique furniture - because their designers did so in an unstuffy, modern and entirely West Coast way. The patrons embracing this look were a rather clubby group of wealthy, sophisticated and adventurous people who were not afraid to enlist the services of architects like Dailey or forward-thinking interior designers like Taylor. ![]() It was an aesthetic that celebrated the locals’ unhurried way of life. The one pictured here features velvet curtains hung from the ceiling and a cast-plaster fireplace.Īs I learned more about 20th-century design in and around San Francisco, a clear picture of the look emerged - relaxed yet refined, defined by the use of clean-lines, light and bright palettes and a mix of old and new. Right: In addition to designing homes for Bay Area A-listers, Michael Taylor opened a series of furniture showrooms in the late 1950s that sold pieces by favorite designers. Seen here in 1961, he shot nearly all the photographs in the volume for top shelter magazines, including House & Garden and Vogue (portrait courtesy of Fred Lyon). Walker championed decorators, like Michael Taylor, who she thought were doing something new to define design on the West Coast, and she collaborated frequently with photographer Fred Lyon, whose elegant but inviting work did as much as the designers themselves to popularize what came to be known as the “California Look.” Left: The book celebrates not only the work of designers but also that of longtime interiors photographer Fred Lyon, now in his late 90s. She knew everyone who was anyone in local society. I visited houses by the San Francisco modernist architect Gardner Dailey, who was a favorite of the city’s elite from the 1930s through the ’60s, and I met Dorothea Walker, a local contributor to the magazine for more than four decades. designers like Waldo Fernandez and Kalef Alaton, who carried this low-key but glamorous approach into the present.ĭuring those early days at House & Garden, I was introduced to design in the Bay Area, too. ![]() All photos by Fred LyonĪt the time, the magazine was also publishing projects by contemporary L.A. Top: Taylor deployed an all-white scheme in a Bay Area home he designed in 1960. Its living area, seen above, featured Victorian chairs and an Art Nouveau table topped by lamps of his own design. Among the Dickinson projects included is his own home, an 1893 converted firehouse in San Francisco’s Pacific Heights neighborhood. The new Rizzoli volume Inventing the California Look: Interiors by Frances Elkins, Michael Taylor, John Dickinson, and Other Design Innovators provides a unique window into the mid-to-late-20th-century talents whose work defined a cutting-edge West Coast aesthetic. Both the furniture and the rooms he designed epitomized the laid-back Southern California lifestyle. Haines’s mid-century projects - for clients including Betsy Bloomingdale, in Los Angeles, and Walter and Leonore Annenberg, at their Sunnylands estate in Rancho Mirage - displayed a modern, casual elegance. May 22, 2022When I moved from New York to Los Angeles in 1989 to work for House & Garden magazine, one of the first stories I wrote was about the tea parties given by the photographer and Hollywood insider Jean Howard in her Beverly Hills living room, which was designed in the 1940s by silent film star turned decorator to the stars William Haines, better known as Billy. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |