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I should have thanked both the turtledoves and that woman for being positioned exactly where I wanted them for this photo. This is a view of Neutra's garden studio, from 1940, situated in the rear of the courtyard. It's the only surviving structure from the 1963 fire that destroyed the rest of the house. Photo ©Darren Bradley One of the best things about Los Angeles is that there are so many modernist homes there.  And even better than that, there are even a few you can visit. Neutra's VDL Research House in Silver Lake is one of the best examples.  Neutra's VDL Research House II. Photo ©Darren Bradley The VDL Research House II was the home of architect Richard Neutra. It's called "2" because it replaced the earlier 1932 VDL Research House that Neutra built.  The original house was a simpler design, with fewer materials. It was built thanks to a no-interest loan by a wealthy Dutch industrialist named  Cees H. Van der Leeuw (hence the VDL name).  Here are a...

The Leo F. Cain Library at Cal State Dominguez Hills (originally called the Educational Resource Center) was designed by A. Quincy Jones and opened in 1972. It gives me chills walking up to it, it's so beautiful. Photo ©Darren Bradley One of my favorite architects, A. Quincy Jones , designed a great number of university buildings throughout the years. But he also had the opportunity to plan and design an entire college campus, including all of the original buildings. This college is located just up the road from me so I took a spontaneous trip there recently one morning for quick visit. That school is California State University Dominguez Hills in Carson, California.  Leo F. Cain Library at CSU Dominguez Hills. Photo ©Darren Bradley I recently mentioned AQJ's role in designing the original buildings for UC Irvine, alongside William Pereira. He also designed the arts and theater building at UC San Diego (below).  Erickson Hall (Mandeville Center for the Arts) at UCSD, designe...

Trinity Presbyterian Church by Culver Heaton (1961). Photo ©Darren Bradley After the Googie-style college campus from last week, I thought it would be appropriate to show a Googie-style church. The Trinity Presbyterian Church was designed in 1961 by Culver Heaton.  I spotted this humongous A-frame perched up on top of a hill while I was driving past on the freeway.  There it is up on the hill, on the right. No, I wasn't shooting photos while driving on the freeway. This photo is courtesy of Google street view.  I took the next exit and turned around, trying to figure out how to get up to it - very excited that I'd stumbled upon some undiscovered hidden treasure. And then I arrived and realized that this was the same church I had photographed about ten years ago (no, you don't get to see those photos - they were terrible). But more importantly, my friend Steve Aldana had just visited and photographed this place, and written about on his blog, Esoteric Survey .  S...