Category Archives: Book/Film Reviews

Past blast: Review of Versaci’s “new old” house book

Posted on January 27, 2014 by David Brussat

My blog on how to resolve the difficulty of finding an old house to buy mentioned Russell Versaci’s prefab houses, but I was unable to access my review of his book from 2008. Here it is, reprinted courtesy of The … Continue reading →

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Can’t find/afford an old house? Try this

Posted on January 26, 2014 by David Brussat

This article by Dale Hrabi in the Wall Street Journal called to mind my dear old neighborhood in D.C. and our friends the van der Taks (three sons, Steven, Derek and Laurens, whose ages closely matched those of me and … Continue reading →

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“The Monster-Builder” – A play

Posted on January 16, 2014 by David Brussat

Nikos Salingaros, the University of Texas mathematician and architectural philosopher whose most trenchant book is Anti-Architecture and Deconstruction, has sent me news of a new play by Amy Freed called “The Monster-Builder,” a play (on words) of Ibsen’s “The Master-Builder.” … Continue reading →

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Blast from past: Review of Millais’s “Exploding …”

Posted on January 11, 2014 by David Brussat

I’ve mentioned Malcolm Millais’s Exploding the Myths of Modern Architecture several times in recent posts. Malcolm, a Brit who lives in Portugal, has sent innumerable nuggets that have helped me push this blog over the edge for years. He is … Continue reading →

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Wherefore art thou, Corbuseo?

Posted on January 5, 2014 by David Brussat

Correspondent Malcolm Millais, author of Exploding the Myths of Modern Architecture (2009) has sent me a 29-minute BBC clip of a radio show, “Great Lives,” starring the modernist Sir David Chipperfield rattling on about Le Corbusier, one of, no, perhaps … Continue reading →

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Julius Shulman shot modernism

Posted on December 29, 2013 by David Brussat

Don’t I wish! The architectural photographer in fact probably did more to promote and then to revive modern architecture than anyone after it was briefly sidetracked by postmodernism. Above is perhaps Shulman’s most iconic photograph, of the Stahl House overlooking … Continue reading →

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FLW on Corbu – Let’s you and him fight!

Posted on December 27, 2013 by David Brussat

Here’s Frank Lloyd Wright taking a poke at Le Corbusier. Much fun, with the Great Man’s insecurities, if that is what they were, exposed. But still no cape. Maybe Corbu swiped it. Here’s the vid on YouTube. Hey, what’s Ludwig … Continue reading →

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Bad Mad Men

Posted on December 21, 2013 by David Brussat

See them (the bad mad men) lurking in the background? Please don’t remove the foreground (the bad mad, often angry, women)! So here’s Dan Bishop, production designer for Mad Men, describing (I think in Dwell magazine, as my source seems … Continue reading →

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Illustrations for “Paradise Planned” column

Posted on December 20, 2013 by David Brussat

Here are illustrations for today’s column, published earlier, called “Garden suburbs as ‘Paradise Planned.’ ” Eventually they will appear with the Journal’s online version of the column as they once did with my old blog, and will be linked weekly … Continue reading →

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Column: Garden suburb as “Paradise Planned”

Posted on December 19, 2013 by David Brussat

I had planned to take the bus to work on Tuesday morning, lugging the new book “Paradise Planned: The Garden Suburb and the Modern City” in my trusty Penguin bag, hauling it in from our house in the suburbs — … Continue reading →

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