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Dear DnA readers,
I hope you are doing well and looking forward to the upcoming festivals in the season of darker days.
I was lucky enough to take a three-day retreat this past weekend from our confusing world with its nattering AI agents and multiple election choices, and step into the realm of pure design aspiration at the Monterey Design Conference.
Hosted by AIA California, this design lovefest consists of back-to-back talks by architects invited from around the world, many responding in highly creative ways to dehumanized environments.
Bait ur Rouf Jame mosque, Dhaka, 2012. Designed by Marina Tabassum Architects
Speakers included headliner Ma Yansong (Lucas Museum) with his voluptuous organic creations and Marina Tabassum of Dhaka, Bangladesh, admired for her restful, brick courtyard houses and her modern mosque, above, designed to create the sublime through showers of celestial light, instead of symbols like minarets.
Then there were Maurizio Pezo and Sofia von Ellrichshausen, of Pezo von Ellrichshausen, a couple seemingly joined in life and mind who design serene, monastic buildings, realizing in concrete the many evocative paintings they also co-create (below).
Pezo von Ellrichshausen, UBB Innovation Center, Concepción, Chile, 2018. Oil on canvas, 300 × 300 mm. Courtesy of PVE archive/Drawing Matter
One of the themes that emerged from MDC was stewardship and adaptive reuse, instead of adding new structures to an overdeveloped planet.
Beijing-based architect Xu Tiantian, of DnA Design and Architecture, displayed examples of "architectural acupuncture" in China, such as her marvelous insertions of staircases, terraces, and viewing platforms into abandoned quarries in Jinyun County in Zhejiang Province, below, turning a former jobs source into a tourist destination, and reinvigorating a depressed community.
Jinyun quarry, converted by Xu Tiantian. Photo courtesy DnA Design and Architecture
What makes the conference work is the setting, the Asilomar Conference Grounds designed by Julia Morgan. The combination of the woodsy, craftsman, and coastal modern architecture, the deer springing past as you wander the misty dunes, and the open doors letting the sea breezes into the conference hall reinforces the message from architects of buildings with similarly sensory power. All this makes it one of the standout design conferences — and a reminder of the lack of character and delight in so many hermetically sealed convention centers.
Speaking of adaptive reuse and Julia Morgan, one of the designers in LA who has made a name in relation to both is Frederick Fisher and Partners, architect of many a place that blends old and new, such as the Annenberg Beach House. Its original structure was designed by Julia Morgan for Randolph Hearst and his companion Marion Davies. Fisher preserved what remained -- the Marion Davies guest house and aquamarine pool — and added a modern "ruin" below.
Image courtesy Frederick Fisher and Partners
This is an approach to preservation, he says, that is not nostalgic but rather echoes the Roman God Janus, who had two opposing faces, one that looks backward into the past (memory), and the other looks forward into the future (anticipation).
I will talk with Fred about his two-way-facing preservation projects at the upcoming Santa Monica Conservancy Awards and fundraiser, where he is the honored guest. This is just one of many upcoming Design Things to Do! Read on for more.
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Design Things To Do
Top Pick: The Great Lautner Bake-Off
Have you ever felt the urge to create structures that feel like they could fly? Put your inner wild architect to the test at a risk-free scale by entering Cantilever and Crumb, Sugar and Structure: A John Lautner Bake-Off.
This competition, hosted by Friends of Residential Treasures Los Angeles (FORT), “challenges participants to craft an edible work inspired by Lautner’s dramatic forms, structural daring, organic materials.” Enter a concept, and selected finalists will receive a $200 stipend to realize their designs, judged by KCRW Good Food host Evan Kleiman, who once resided in the Lautner-designed Sheats Apartments, together with Chef Shimi Aaron, and architects David Hertz and Kristopher Conner. The October 28th deadline for proposals has been extended to Friday, October 30th, 12:00 PM for readers of this newsletter. Just add KCRWDNA in the submission bio in this form.
Image courtesy, FORT: LA.
The cakes will be unveiled and judged live at FORT's Architecture Uncorked! on Saturday, November 14th, at Barnsdall Gallery Theatre. There — yes, there’s more! — I’ll talk with Frank Escher about all things Lautner, including Escher and partner Ravi Gunewardena's restoration of the Chemosphere House (hear them also at a SCI-Arc talk, Interactions With History, on November 4th.)
Finally, the FORT Trail for the spooky month focuses on — yes, you’ve guessed it, five Lautner classic houses — reinterpreted by Amber Benson (Witches of Echo Park trilogy and for playing Tara Maclay on Buffy the Vampire Slayer) for her popular Witch House series: Witch House 7: Where Wizards Work.
Hope you got enough Lautner.
Quick Picks
Worried about future jobs in arts and culture? Head over to ASU (at the Herald Examiner building) for the State of the Worker Summit this Thursday, October 29th, from 10:00 AM to 2:00 PM. Hosted by Somos Accelerator for Economic Resilience (SAFER), experts from business, labor, government, academia, philanthropy, and community organizations “will explore the technological developments driving the economy” and how they might “impact workers in the arts, culture, and media.” Click here to RSVP.
Photo by Frances Anderton
WestEdge Design Fair returns to The Barker Hangar at Santa Monica Airport later this month, showcasing more than 150 exhibitors, including six selected "emerging designers," vendors past (Tesselle, below) and new, and a robust line-up of talks, including a Saturday conversation I'll lead with members of Team Palisades, about the status of reconstruction and lessons learned from past and present rebuilds in the fire zone. WestEdge starts Thursday, October 29th, with an opening party (tunes provided by hubby Robin Bennett Stein aka DJ Caviar) and runs through Saturday, October 31st.
KCRW Members get complimentary Friday or Saturday tickets to the WestEdge Design Fair. Find the details in the KCRW app. Not a member? Become one so you don’t miss out on perks like these.
Tesselle tiles. Photo by Frances Anderton
If you happen to be in the San Bernardino area, check out Luz entre Sombras (Light Among Shadows), an exhibition of lovely photos by Salvador A. Solórzano Barrera (below and top of page), showing how "candlelight, cempasúchil flowers, and carefully arranged altars bring generations together," as they honor their dead in communities around Lake Pátzcuaro, including Janitzio, Tzintzuntzan, Ihuatzio, and Santa Fe de la Laguna. They are on display for a month from November 2nd at the Mexican Consulate, 293 D Street, San Bernardino, CA 92401.
Photo by Salvador A. Solórzano Barrera
In case you thought housing was shaped by designers, think again; the forms of our buildings largely follow rules. See just how in The Shape of Housing: Koreatown Walking Tour, taking place next Saturday, Nov 7th, 10:00 AM–1:00 PM. I’ll join the folks at Abundant Housing and friends for a morning stroll through Koreatown “to talk housing, architecture, and the hidden building codes that shape our streets.” It will be an easy stroll, wrapping with complimentary Korean pastries and coffee at MaDang Courtyard!
Why do today's buildings look like this? Photo by Frances Anderton.
Angel City Lumber launched the Angel City Reciprocity Project to help support homeowners rebuild with salvaged lumber. Next Saturday, November 7th, join ACL’s Jeff Perry and Marty Johnson of LA Woodshop for a lecture and demo on the lumber they have sourced and how to cut, prepare, and apply it within your home. Free with a $50 deposit fee that will be returned upon arrival. Click here to RSVP.
Image courtesy Angel City Lumber
Every day should be a Corita Day, but the beloved artist and activist gets special attention next Saturday, November 7th, from 12:00–4:00 PM, when SCI-Arc opens its doors to the Corita Day Festival, an afternoon of “art-making, music, food, and creativity inspired by the legacy of Corita Kent.” The programming includes a DJ set by Novena Carmel, Host of KCRW's MBE, and live music and entertainment from The Hollow Trees and Bob Baker Marionette. It kicks off with a Corita Day Benefit Brunch at Hauser & Wirth, raising funds for the Corita Art Center, now located in the Arts District. SCI-Arc is at 350 Merrick Street, LA 90013.
Image courtesy Corita Art Center
What did the space race mean to painters, filmmakers, and sculptors from the East, the West, and the Global South? That’s the question posed by the Wende Museum in Competing Cosmologies: Interpreting the Sky, a show of contemporary and Cold War-era artwork from artists from around the world, arranged across four sections: Astronomy, the Space Race, Futurisms, and Aliens. Also on show are historical artifacts, including a full-scale model of Sputnik. The public opening takes place Saturday, November 7th, 2:00–5:00 PM. Click here to reserve a spot.
Meanwhile, not far across the galaxy, get ready for the November 13th opening of The Samuel Oschin Air and Space Center, the expansion of the California Science Center in Exposition Park, now the permanent home of space shuttle Endeavour.
Image courtesy Wende Museum
Santa Monica Conservancy’s 2026 Annual Preservation Awards, honoring architect Frederick Fisher and Partners and their long legacy in the beach city, take place on Sunday, November 8th. I’ll talk to him about the 1970s Santa Monica (and Venice) that shaped him, and his signature projects that combine past and future, restoration and addition, as modeled at Annenberg Beach House, City Hall East, below Bergamot Station, and more. (Note: students get a discount.)
Image courtesy Frederick Fisher and Partners
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