ARCHITECTURE’S TWO REMOTE ISLANDS – TOO REMOTE?

Two homes stand as icons in the twentieth century: the Charles & Ray Eames House, (now the Eames Foundation), at Pacific Palisades near Santa Monica in California; and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Jacobs House at Madison, Wisconsin. They both hold a position in history that is prominent, bold and clear; they are both landmarks and are enigmatically beautiful. The Eames house was an exercise in the use of standard parts to fabricate a dwelling for the Californian climate; the Jacobs House was a Usonian house, an idea promoted by Wright to create a true vernacular residence for the masses. Both achieved a status far beyond the usual ambitions to be ordinary private homes, but probably did not, could not, exceed the intentions of their designers who thrived on self-promotion.

Location of Jacobs House

The idea was to look at these locations in Google Earth and Street View to see their particular contexts, their ‘real’ world rather than their ‘glossy magazine’ identities. Street View, (which here will refer to Google Earth and its Street View extension), is an astonishing tool that allows places to be seen by the ordinary camera, as though by the strolling passerby, through an unedited lens expecting nothing but what is there, rather than as the precise, selectively framed architectural eye might choose to see them, with its self-conscious manipulation of frames, scopes and angles. In Street View, one sees these places ‘as they really are,’ as if one was nonchalantly meandering down the road. The camera has not been employed in any way other than to collect the raw ‘street view’ itself, without any bells and whistles, or artful interpretation. The Street View lens makes no adjustment for anything other than faces and numbers that are fuzzed out for privacy. There have been surprises before: see - https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2017/10/the-need-for-street-view-in-architecture.html A review of different projects is always interesting, frequently surprising.

Quite wonderfully, Google Earth spins the globe around just by entering the names ‘Eames House’ (corrected to ‘Eames Foundation’), and ‘Jacobs House,’ (confirmed as ‘Herbert and Katharine Jacobs House’), without any further clues: such is the standing of these places. With both projects, one is amazed, indeed, a little bewildered with what one sees. These houses stand not only as examples of classic twentieth century architecture, but they can also be seen as revealing and confirming the state of architecture in our era, both its unique and special difference, and the managed delivery of the messages that makes projects uniquely identifiable and memorable in media: in short, in Street View, one sees the ‘undistorted’ image . . . well, there is some distortion from time to time. Maybe one should say the ‘unconsidered’ image; perhaps 'ill-considered.'

Each building has developed an aura in one’s general perception and understanding that rarely gets questioned. It is frequently an image and a feeling that has been grown on hagiography. There is a presence that enriches and sustains the mystique that has developed around both of these works and their prominence through the media. They make a good pair, not only with their matching reputations, but also because of their similar, singular and separate siting that makes them remote islands in a sea of development, separated from the masses by masses of trees, as if to shut the chaos out, to isolate and protect the genius. They both stand alone as memorable, individual architectural pieces. This separation highlights and confirms the state of architecture today where it is seen as special and different, ‘arty’ building, personal expression - bespoke. The observation is that the world really has not been significantly changed by their presence other than inspirationally.#

The Jacobs House is located on a corner site that is filled with mature trees that conceal most of the property, both from the street and from the air. The aerial view reveals only the schematic arrangement of the house around the courtyard space, but little more. The front of the house, the side approached by the visitor, can be partially seen from the street. A light pole and trees block a clear view of the whole. One immediately recognises the building and can enjoy its scale – tiny – and its elegant modesty and snug beauty. One remains astonished at the fineness of the edge of the roofs that slide over the lovely earthy hues of the timber and brick, floating in the deep, shady greens.

NOTE: see below for more images of Jacobs House and its context

Only when one sees the drawings does it become clear what Wright has done here. It is a roof detail that has been frequently reproduced in recent years with the ambition to maintain fine, hi-tech edges. What really is a surprise are the neighbours: all one sees from Street View are the usual suburban American homes. It is as if the little Wright house was not there, or might as well not be. It sits as an aside; it is buried in trees, shaded from the outnumbering neighbours, and much of the literally ‘suburban’ street. The classic architectural visions, as seen in the media, can be reconstructed in these general views, in the unfamiliar context of the neighbours – the nearby hammock; the adjacent washing; the quaintly indifferent, ordinary ‘American’ homes that are never revealed in the architectural promotions.

Location of Eames House

The Eames House is equally surprising. It is almost invisible from the street and the air. Some 360 degree point images on the site help one understand the location in which the residence plays almost an insignificant role, tucked in off to one side. One carries the impression from the architectural images that this beautiful residence stands proudly on a large block of land covered with trees, perhaps in a wonderful forest of gums. Street View shows that it is tucked in tightly below a road, against a high cutting on a treed ledge that overlooks the Pacific Ocean and the sprawling, ad hoc development of Santa Monica. None of this is ever shown in the magazines that concentrate on the prettiness of the Mondrian forms and colours in the contrast of the bush – the lovely Australian eucalypts with patterned peeling trunks and dancing dappled light.

The approach to the house shows a frilly-edged, fabric shelter that is a surprise given that one expects everything ‘Eames’ to be wonderfully designed, considered, and placed, if not by, then with some sensitivity shown to the couple who designed this little gem of a dwelling. It is a quaint variation from their commitment to both design and display. Is it the ticket box? The context of this place is remarkable. Just above the roof which is close to aligning with the higher street level, is a construction barrier that suggests that the block will be getting some neighbourly supervision soon. The idyllic ‘everything’ about this place becomes challenged. It not only sits below a road, but also above a six-lane highway that separates the block from the ocean. One’s imagination never located the ‘Eames house’ off to one side in this somewhat awkward, in-between juxtaposition.

Both of these houses are challenged by the new perceptions, but they hold such a place in memory and dreams that the disappointment, the astonishment, only prods beliefs, but never sufficiently to change or redirect them: maybe to just adjust them. Has one become so completely committed to these places by ‘magazine brain washing’ that nothing, not even any revealed fudging or cheating, will change any intimate belief? It is a strange experience. It seems that architects have been trained to see things as they have been promoted, rather than as they are: seeing as. Do we need to become otherwise?

That both of these projects are smothered in trees located in a hubbub of very ordinary development says much the same about architecture as we know it today – that it means very little to everyday lives in spite of the intentions and ambitions of each: one to build out of ordinary pieces; the other, to build for ordinary living. Ironically, these houses are literally swamped by the swell of ordinariness, such are their differences. They may have made dreams, but have had very little impact on how we all actually live today. This is perhaps why they have almost become just tourist attractions, seen as quirky, heroic designs that exist only to be visited and gawked at; glistening gems standing in the blurb of the everyday, with their wonder protected, shrouded by dense greenery, like fragile jewels packaged in bubble wrap, as if they were too frail to withstand the exposure to things ordinary: or are they shielding their purity from pollution? Maybe they are. Is this their failure, or does it lie elsewhere, in us? Have they become a metaphor for good design that we must try to change rather than perpetuate? They are remarkable pieces, but are they serving us well? Are they merely works holding a place in history, the past, with no positive message for the future – has-beens?

We need to consider what we are looking at when we see these two islands, and try to see them for what they really might be rather than the way in which we might like to see them, or prefer to see them. Their locations sit like text inside enclosing brackets in a paragraph, as an aside to the main narrative. If we are to learn from these two works, then we need to find a way to incorporate quality outcomes in the everyday rather than maintain the mystery and magic of the selective visions and their special stories. The lesson might be in their failures rather than in their prominence and beauty: in their aloofness.

NOTE: see below for more images of Eames House and its context

It might be serendipity, or Jung’s synchronicity. The recent re-reading of an older text shortly after writing this piece, showed that the theme has been spoken about before: see - https://voussoirs.blogspot.com/2015/06/ronchamp-rest-areas-and-meaning.html

Is it critical that we have buildings stripped of their essential functional contexts and accessories, and the machines and people that they have been shaped to accommodate for us to properly enjoy and assess ‘architecture’? One gets the feeling that architecture is lessened, belittled by simple, ordinary reality and its necessary needs; that it is uniquely special and demanding, at its best when aloof: that it is annoyed, demeaned by such factual matters. This is a serious problem. This makes architecture more like a slick gallery ‘art’ exhibition rather than a real life facility to accommodate the needs of functions and the functions of needs.

JACOBS HOUSE

more house, place and context

EAMES HOUSE

more house, place and context

NOTE:

All images apart from the first two 'professional' images, and the drawings and eaves image of the Jacobs House, have been taken from Google Earth and Street View.

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8 MARCH 2019

International Women's Day 2019

Google's Logo for the day:

It is in this sense that one can be inspired by these two houses.