Some area homes make writer’s atlas of iconic midcentury marvels
WRITER ORGANIZES AN ATLAS OF ICONIC MIDCENTURY HOMES, INCLUDING CONNECTICUT’S
Dominic Bradbury’s latest book covers a lot of ground. So much so he’s organized it by continent. The “Atlas of MidCentury Modern Houses” details homes in England and Saxony, Mexico and São Paulo, Istanbul and Casablanca and Tel Aviv … and more than a few notable homes in Connecticut.
“The region to the north of New York and around Harvard and Yale was a definite hot spot of design,” Bradbury said via email. “There were many emigre architects who settled in New England, such as Breuer and Gropius. But then we also have the pioneers such as Philip Johnson and Eliot Noyes in New Canaan and other hot spots in Cape Cod, so New England as a whole was definitely a key region in midcentury architecture and design.”
Johnson’s Glass House is iconic in the region. In the book, Bradbury calls it “simultaneously derivative and original,” borrowing from Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, but original in how it uses the landscape.
“The setting is extraordinary, with Johnson’s estate growing to 19 hectares (47 acres) and the Glass House perched on the brow of a hill overlooking a wooded pond below,” Bradbury writes.
Another notable Connecticut home featured in Bradbury’s “Atlas” is Richard Foster’s Round House which, somewhat uniquely, actually revolves.
Round houses were — in part thanks to innovations in structural engineering — something of a fad for midcentury avant garde architects, and Bradbury said Foster’s is representative.
“Round houses offered some similar benefits in terms of connectivity to
their surroundings, given their potential for more expansive views, and represent another repeated motif of the period,” Bradbury writes in the introduction.
But Foster’s, unlike other circular houses, “turned like a sunflower to follow the sun.”
It was another attempt, Bradbury said, to access the regional setting.
“Foster found an enticing 1.6hectare (4acre) site near Wilton, with a natural ‘amphitheatre’ sitting among the woods,” Bradbury writes. “To make the most of the natural surroundings, the architect designed a ‘circambulant house’ or moving home. The mushroomshaped building sits atop a gentle hill and revolves around a central staircase.”
This use of the landscape is common in midcentury architecture, particularly in Connecticut and New England. When asked about the trend, Bradbury called it “contextual.”
“Many emigre architects such as Breuer and Gropius adapted their work to a New England context both in terms of responses to the landscape and local materials,” he said. “The more you look at the work of midcentury modernists in the region, the more you see the use of local, natural materials such as timber and field stone spliced with modernist principles and new engineering. These are contextual midcentury houses and homes.”
New Canaan is well represented, being home to both Johnson and Eliot Noyes. (“In the woods of New Canaan, he designed a singlestorey home hidden by characterful outer walls of fieldstone front and back,” Bradbury writes of Noyes’ family home.)
But it’s not all Fairfield County. Marcel Breuer’s Stillman house — one of three built by the architect for the Stillman family — is an odd, almost cottagelooking design that combines both modern and classical themes.
The home “sits on a gently sloping site, just outside the town of Litchfield, with a borderland of mature trees all around that creates a particular sense of privacy and escapism,” Bradbury writes.
Bradbury’s “Atlas” (Phaidon Press, October, 2019) is, according to the publisher, “The most complete indepth survey of MidCentury Modern residential architecture ever published.” The introduction alone to “Atlas of MidCentury Modern Houses” offers an indepth structural and stylistic history and examination of midcentury architecture.
Bradbury said in an interview that “It was an era of optimism and experimentation that built upon the lessons of the pioneering, early modernists but added in multiple layers of playfulness, texture and delight.”
“There was a big emphasis on fluid, organic and informal living spaces along with insideoutside connectivity and many other things besides,” he said. :Yet, at the same time, one of the great things about midcentury design was that it allowed for such a wide range of contexts and solutions.”
For Bradbury, the era was one of exploration. He said that sense of freedom has been lost, due to a toorigid adherence to perceived artistic boundaries.
“To my mind, the ’50s and ’60s were a time when designers and architects turned their hands to all sorts of different things in an open minded manner — houses, buildings, furniture, lighting and more,” he said. “So there was this rich creative overlap between the disciplines. Now the boundaries between the disciplines are much more defined and rigid, so I think we have lost something because of this related to the creative crosspollination of ideas.”
“When we break down borders, then ideas start to flow,” he said.