Case Study House Program In January 1945, when the imminent end of the war was evident, the California magazine Art & Architecture, devoted to modern art, design and architecture, launched its most ambitious project, called the Case Study House Program. With millions of American soldiers soon to return to the country to start families and build homes, the magazine’s editors asked eight leading architects to give their suggestions for a low-cost, functional, modern house whose elements can be industrially produced and which would could easily be multiplied. It is planned that the magazine will finance the construction of these houses, and then publish their detailed descriptions in it, and they would be available for visiting by all interested visitors.

The project succeeded beyond all expectations, so it continued and lasted for the next 20 years, and instead of the planned eight, in the end 36 projects were completed, and most of the houses were actually built. Although this was not the original idea, in reality the project specialized in houses adapted to Southern California, and most of the architects hired were from Los Angeles, in whose wider area almost all the houses in the program were built. Among others, Richard Neutra, Eero Saarinen, Charles Eemes, Raphael Soriano and other architectural stars of their time, all the luminaries of American modernism, contributed their projects. More than half a century has passed since the culmination of this whole program, enough to see the extent of its long-term cultural impact. In fact, interest was high from the very beginning and when the first six houses were built in 1948, they had more than 350,000 visitors. But since the media was not yet global at the time, the program’s impact was initially limited to magazine readers and Southern California residents who could see the houses being built firsthand. Nevertheless, step by step, gradually but inexorably, the ideas developed in this program took over the whole world, and the key media in their dissemination were photography and film.

Indirectly, the main goal of the program was achieved – the mass production of such houses. It was created by entrepreneur Joseph Eichler based on Raphael Soriano’s projects.

Houses from the program

Of the 36 houses designed as part of this program, whose presentation was published in the magazine, 24 were realized, only two were demolished in the meantime, and four were more seriously reconstructed, while the remaining eighteen retained their original character and today have a cult status. The numbering that the magazine used is still used today among fans of the program, usually paired with an alternate name that indicates the original owner of the house, for example, Case Study House # 9 (abbreviated as CSH#9)  or Estenza House.

Although no restrictions were placed on the designers, the project task still led them to some similar solutions. A typical house was one-story, with a flat roof, the construction was made of steel profiles, the walls were prefabricated, as well as the ceiling with an exposed corrugated or trapezoidal load-bearing sheet on the underside. Some walls were completely glass. The transition from the exterior to the interior space was understated, and when the surrounding nature allowed it, the effect of natural drama was brought into the interior. The buildings were adapted to the microclimatic conditions, and protection against solar radiation in the summer period was especially emphasized, because the use of air conditioners was to be avoided.

For some engaged architects, such as Richard Neutra, it was just an episode in a career, which was otherwise dedicated to such architecture. For some others, that project represented the pinnacle of their career, and in the continuation of their professional practice, they focused on designing family houses in the style of California modernism and elaborated on the ideas started on that occasion. In particular, for one of them, Pierre Koenig, participation in this program marked his entire life.

Pierre Koenig and the culmination of the program

Although the Case Study House Program was not conceived as a competition, so there was no expert jury to evaluate the projects, and no readers cast their votes, time somehow produced a clear winner of this program. It was Pierre Koenig, a young architect from Los Angeles. He had his first contact with the Case Study House program when, as a very young associate of Raphael Soriano, he drew renderings for his project within the program. About ten years later, he gained enough experience and reputation to be personally invited by the editor of the magazine to do his project. He did, in a short period of time, two projects, both houses were realized and today they are considered the most successful objects of the entire program.

It is considered that the first of those two houses, Case Study House #21, which was built in 1959, and which we know today as the Bailey House, best answered the basic design task that the magazine set before the designers. It is a house with a steel structure, exposed trapezoidal sheet metal as a ceiling and industrially produced plasterboard walls. The top quality of the project was that with such simple and cheap means, it was achieved that the house and the lifestyle in it were glamorous, and that by the fact that the building was unusually skilfully adapted to the natural environment and microclimatic conditions. This also meant that the project would have to be corrected for each new location, but the base was essentially set. After the success of this project, it could be said that the mission of Art & Architecture magazine could be completed, because all the originally set goals were achieved.

But Koenig’s second house, Case Study House #22, or Stahl House, from 1960 followed, and was an even more spectacular success. In terms of construction and production, it was a continuation of the previous building, but it was built on a dramatic slope of the terrain, in a place where other construction methods are not feasible. Koenig turned that dramatic slope into an advantage and achieved a glamor that had not been seen before. A key role in the promotion of this building was played by Julius Shulman, a famous architectural photographer, who at that time worked for Art & Architecture magazine. He welcomed the most beloved object in his long career and did not let it go. He photographed it from selected angles, both day and night, and at dusk, both in the sun and under clouds, both empty and with elegant ladies in the interior. Wouldn’t you like to live in a house with visible load-bearing steel profiles, plaster walls and trapezoidal sheet metal on the ceiling? Think again, because if ever F.L.Wright’s Fallingwater’s position on the pedestal of America’s most beloved houses was shaken, it was when Shulman’s photographs of Koenig’s Stahl House appeared in Art & Architecture magazine. 

The worldwide success of Californian modernism

The Case Study House Program was one of the elements in the formation of the lifestyle that arose in California in the middle of the twentieth century and that led to previously unattainable relaxation, free-spiritedness and glamour. The formation of the architectural style that dominated the Case Study House program began, of course, earlier, before the war, and the originators were, in essence, Frank Lloyd Wright, Rudolph Schindler and Richard Neutra. In its developed form, the style was called various names with nuances in meaning, including American modernism, mid-century modernism and organic architecture, but it is most accurate to call it Californian modernism.

California modernism was characterized by simplicity, practicality, minimalist elimination of everything unnecessary, unless it was part of some unprecedented glamorous experiment. Glamor came either from fitting in with, the harsher the better, the surrounding nature or from futurism that emphasizes that we are in a heroic, space age.

Note that not all leading architects participated in the Case Study Houses program and it is not always clear why. Frank Lloyd Wright was already old and did not live in California, but his son, known simply as Lloyd Wright, himself a top architect, lived and worked in Los Angeles, but did not contribute to the project. Schindler died in 1953, so he could participate in the first phase of the program. The most painful, however, is the absence of John Lautner, F.L.Wright’s student and collaborator, but not a blind follower, who formed his own style and designed the most extravagant buildings in Los Angeles. Perhaps he could not adapt to the demand for cheap construction?

Time took its toll and the objects of Californian modernism became an inspiration to followers around the world. Koenig’s Stahl House and Lautner’s properties are frequent locations for filming high-glamour movie scenes, which gave the whole movement an additional tailwind. A special story is the contribution of the aforementioned photographer Julius Shulman, whose inventiveness flourished together with the brilliance of this architectural direction. When Shulman reluctantly retired, it was in protest against postmodernism, in whose promotion he wanted no part. However, temporarily, at the age of 95, he returned to professional practice, only to once again make a series of photographs of the newly reconstructed Koenig’s Bailey House, because “no one can do it as well as him”.