US Modernist Radio
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Join Mr. Modernism George Smart and crew as they talk and laugh with people who enjoy, own, create, dream about, preserve, love, and hate Modernist architecture, the most exciting and controversial buildings in the world. USModernist Radio is backed by the nonprofit educational archive USModernist, the largest open digital archive for Modernist residential architecture in America.
US Modernist Radio
2d ago
We’ll talk today about Texas and California, two of our most populous states that could not be more different, with Kathryn O’Rourke and Ben Koush, authors of Home, Heat, Money, God: Texas and Modern Architecture; and Michael Webb, author of California Houses: Creativity in Context ..read more
US Modernist Radio
1w ago
Talking architecture can be a little dense, wordy, and imponderable, especially for people who aren’t architects but just love talking about, visiting, and being inspired by cool buildings. Today we talk with two noted populists who make architecture understandable, architect and professor Christopher Wilson, and journalist and architourist Ken MacIntyre of modtraveler.com. Later on, musical guest Emilie-Claire Barlow.  ..read more
US Modernist Radio
2w ago
Landscape architects are the ninjas of the design world, silently orchestrating beauty around buildings while you’re too busy staring at your phone. They decide whether that park bench is in the sun or shade, the exact curve of a sidewalk, and how to make an average building look extraordinary. They’re the ones who make sure your city doesn’t feel like a concrete jungle and that your suburban sprawl doesn’t completely lose touch with nature. Today we’ll talk with two exceptional landscape architects, Chris LaGuardia and Michael Van Valkenburgh. Later, music with Pink Martini’s Timothy Ni ..read more
US Modernist Radio
3w ago
In nearly every major city, housing the homeless is a major problem. Since the defunding of residential mental health programs in Reagan era, the dramatic cost of housing, and other cutbacks in the welfare safety net, America created a huge population of people with problems who have nowhere to live except outside. Especially in California, which has the most homeless citizens in America, everyone recognizes the problem but there’s complete lack of political will or consensus to significantly address it. Even with the better ideas, there’s a generally well-funded, lawyered-up ..read more
US Modernist Radio
1M ago
Where does the real work get done in Modernist preservation? State and local preservation groups show up at long, boring, and ridiculously bureaucratic public meetings, week after week, sometimes for years. They get historic preservation tax credits passed in most states, and they monitor everything from development to the preservation easements we talk about frequently. Joining us in the studio are two of these heroes, Preservation Durham’s Julianne Patterson and Preservation North Carolina’s Benjamin Briggs. From Chicago, we’ll talk with Ben Thomas, Executive Director of the Soci ..read more
US Modernist Radio
1M ago
An exhibition last fall on the late architect Myron Goldfinger opened and USModernist was there moderating the panel’s remembrances. Circle Square Triangle: The Architecture of Myron Goldfinger, closed at the end of 2023 but will be touring other locations in 2024. Myron Goldfinger’s signature Modernist houses of the Hamptons and Westchester in New York include the wild party house featured in The Wolf of Wall Street. A favorite architect of New York City’s rich and powerful during the 1980s, Myron died in the summer 2023 at the age of ninety. Talking about Myron Goldfinger’s legacy were his w ..read more
US Modernist Radio
1M ago
Today you’ll hear from Miami architect and author Chad Oppenheim; from Long Beach architect Alan Pullman; from New Canaan author David Peterson, and later we swoon again with returning musical guest Halie Loren singing from her new album.  ..read more
US Modernist Radio
1M ago
US Modernist Radio
1M ago
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 An ..read more
US Modernist Radio
2M ago
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 c ..read more