Unearth Unique Gems at Our Store

“American Gardens has more than 250 archival photographs and plans and an invaluable biography section profiling the schooling and projects of the landscape designers whose work is featured in the book. In a large landscape format, American Gardens captures estate gardens as they existed for one generation, a time when people had the land, the time, and the skill to fulfill the grandest gardening fantasies.” Hardcover: 295 pages, 12 x 9″

Wallace Neff 1895-1982: The Romance of Regional Architecture by Wallace Neff10 x 8, 143 pgs. Softbound. “This a 1989 Huntington Library exhibition catalogue on the eclectic California architect Wallace Neff. Best known for his Mediterranean-inspired houses, Neff’s varied career also included pioneering work in Bubble Housing during and after World War Two. The book also contains essays on the contrasting styles of Neff and Neutra and on Neff’s plans and renderings.”

Sylvanus Marston: Pasadena’s Quintessential Architect by Kathleen Tuttle9 x 11″, 192 pp, Hardbound. “Marston was instrumental in establishing Pasadena as a winter resort and then as a thriving community. He and his firm designed 1000 projects, many of which still survive, including cottages and additions to resort hotels, notable commercial and civic buildings such as the Pacific Asia Museum, and the earliest bungalow court. His residential designs span the range of styles from the Arts and Crafts through English Tudor and Monterey Colonial to, most importantly, Mediterranean Revival. This is an important addition to the literature of California’s Golden Age of architecture.”

The Ferro-Concrete Style by Francis S. Onderdonk8 x 11″, 265 pp, Hardbound. “From the baroque excesses of Los Angeles’s Mayan theater to the starkly expressionist churches of ’20s Europe, this book traces the history of reinforced concrete from its roots through its glory days in the first three decades of this century. Long out of print and hard to find, Onderdonk’s masterful survey has been faithfully reproduced to include the three color plates and over 300 black and white illustrations.”

California Mediterranean by Marc Appleton9 x 11, 208 pp, Hardbound. “In the early 20th-century, architects designing houses for the balmy climate of Southern California were influenced by the style of the villas and palaces that dominated the architecture of Italy, France, Spain, Greece, and Morocco, and a few other North African locales. The resulting style-noted for its pleasing combination of simplicity and dignity, for its often asymetrical undecorated facades-reflected romantic, European forms, and yet distinguished itself by adding American ingenuity. Prime examples of this include Villa Narcissa, widely celebrated for its unimposing grandeur, and Casa Leon, with its stunning hillside location and ocean views. Included here are residences by noted architects such as Julia Morgan, Bertram Goodhue, Addison Mizner, George Washington Smith, Wallace Neff, and others.”