#350: Alastair Gordon + Barbara Gordon + Musical Guest Kate McGarry

Being a Black architect in the white-male-dominated 20th century was tough.  You were paid less, worked harder, and rarely got any credit.  That is, if you could get hired at all. For example, by 1950 there were only two Black architects registered in North Carolina, both male. By 1980 the number was only 65 out of 1909. Even by 1993, Black architects made up only 7.5% nationally.  Today we’ll hear from Charles McAfee, considered by many to be the greatest living African-American architect. The National Trust for Historic Preservation, supported by the Getty Foundation in Los Angeles, is working to share and elevate the achievements of African-American architects, both men and women.  We’ll talk with the director that program, Brent Leggs.  Later on, great jazz with Jaimee Paul.

The 2024 Architecture and Design Film Festival, or ADFF, starts up next week in New York.  This long-running series is led by returning podcast guest Kyle Bergman, who founded the ADFF in New York in 2008 and hosts versions all over the world.  ADFF seeks out films with impassioned, human stories that appeal to both architects and the general design-loving public.  Today we’ll talk with filmmakers who’ve shown at ADFF including Sabine Gisger, Beatrice Minger, Katerina Kliwadenko and Mario Novas. Plus, we’ll talk with Kyle about the highlights for 2024.  Then, it's a great conversation with actor and singer Lucie Arnaz about architecture and jazz - and Spock's half-brother.

For every 3 or 4 Modernist buildings out there, there is likely one amazing unbuilt building with plans sitting in a drawer or a hard drive somewhere.  Exploring the wonderful world of the imagined but not realized, joining us are the authors of Never Built Los Angeles, Never Built New York, and the new book, the Atlas of Never Built Architecture, Sam Lubell and Greg Goldin. Later, music with Chicago’s Paul Giallorenzo.

Today we’re talking about Modernist havens San Diego and La Jolla with midcentury author and historian Keith York; plus Joan Gand and Lauren Lockhart of the La Jolla Historical Society on their upcoming Modernist tour, of which USModernist is a sponsor.  Later on, jazz with Lisa Veronica Wood and the Sidecar Social Club.

It’s a sad day in the studio, because this is the last Modernism Week show of 2024.  We’ve brought you 11 wonderful episodes from our annual pilgrimage, and today wraps up the series with returning guests mid-century historian Charles Phoenix; Natascha Drabbe of iconichouses.org; traveling all the way from Canberra, Australia, Phillip Jones the Martini Whisperer; and Lautner homeowner Andrew Vottero.

Today we’re talking about an architecture TV series spanning the globe and a new design documentary.  Joining us is ByDesign’s Mike Chapman and IBM archivist Jamie Martin, who is featured in the new documentary Modernism Inc.  Later, musical guest Paget Moren.

In this our next to last show from Modernism Week 2024, George talks with San Francisco concrete designer and architect Fu Tung Cheng, and later Marisa Mulder + Jim Burns + Brooke Babcock on composer and arranger Jimmy Van Huesen, who with Frank Sinatra as his muse carried the great American songbook to new heights in the 1950’s and 1960’s.  

When the internet came along, many industries changed forever, and one of them was the auction business.  Remember how exciting eBay was when everything was up for bid?  Traditional auction houses had to move quickly to adapt, and the opportunities of moving from a local to a regional or national or international market through the internet were immense.  One auction firm which has made a wildly successful transition is Leland Little in Hillsborough NC, and we’ll talk inside their Modernist warehouse with Modernist director Luke Newbold.  Later, it’s architect, professor, attorney, and former first lady of Hartford CT, Sara Bronin, chair of the US Advisory Council for Historic Preservation, plus musical guest Roslyn Kind.

If there’s one thing architecture fans love as much as tours and parties, it’s architecture documentaries, and we’ve been covering dozens of those over the years.  Recorded at Modernism Week 2024, George talks with author and Emmy-winning filmmaker Jake Gorst on his new film New England Modernism.  Following that, a chat with Kirk Brown of DesignOnScreen, who funded many of Gorst’s films about Palm Springs, creating a visual history of Modernism.  Later on, musical guest Laura Pursell skates into our hearts. 

Oh California, where the sun is warm.  Where the winds from Santa Ana make you feel like you belong.  California, wherever you may roam.  California keeps calling you home.  Those words from the 1978 movie If Ever I see You Again, a tribute to California. Are you pining to live in the Golden State?  Joining us are today are well-known California architects Leo Marmol, Wally Cunningham, Monika Hafelfinger, and Drew Pedrick.