A. Quincy Jones

by Cory Buckner

Archibald Quincy Jones (1913-79) was a Los Angeles-based architect and educator who shared the Case Study goal of reinventing the house as a way of redefining the way people lived in post-war America. A pioneer in 'greenbelt' planning and 'green' design, Jones raised the level of the tract house in California from the simple stucco box to a structure of beauty and logic surrounded by gardens and integrated into the landscape. He introduced new materials and also a new way of living within the built environment, and his work bridged the gap between custom-built and developer-built homes. The exquisite detailing and siting of Jones's houses, churches, civic and university buildings make them quintessential embodiments of mid-century American architecture. This is the first book published on Jones. It documents his full career, from his post-war planning projects to his long association with Palo Alto building magnate Joseph Eichler. The book is comprised of two a substantial introductory essay tracing Jones's life and career, with a summary of key projects and his contributions to planning; and a catalogue of sixty of Jones's projects illustrated with high-quality black-and-white period photographs, and plans and renderings by Jones.

Genres: Architecture

272 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[L.A.Weekly · Rating 4 out of 5]

By GREG GOLDIN, LA Weekly

Archibald Quincy Jones might have been the quintessential modernist architect. Like his contemporaries in the generation that followed Rudolf Schindler and Richard Neutra, Jones worked with steel and glass and concrete and plywood. He designed to create an interplay between house and garden. He built modest homes, on a modest budget, for clients of modest means. But unlike the others, Jones operated on a massive scale. With his partner, Frederick E. Emmons, Jones designed the seminal Eichler Homes for northern California developer Joseph L. Eichler. Eleven thousand Eichlers were built according to Jones' conception of a small, open floor plan, with nearly every room open to the exterior and flooded with light. Triumphs of compression, the post-and-beam houses, which felt like one large room under one small roof, shaped the idea of postwar, subdivision American life.

What Jones sought to achieve was luxury living on a tight budget and a tiny plot of land. Luxury for Jones meant something other than a shrine to consumerism. It meant ease of living, sensitivity to the site, and elegant use of simple materials. Jones' own Steel House #2, which he built in 1954, is a model of his conception. The one-story, steel-frame house was partially prefabricated offsite and trucked in. Completed in just three months (and later destroyed in minutes in the Bel Air fire), it consisted of a superthin flat roof floating above glass walls. Dead simple; but then Jones took the interior space and rather than carve it up, he left it truly open. Only curtains closed off the living spaces from public areas. The living room doubled as a library, with a bed that converted to a couch. The kitchen was kitchen, family room and dining room all in one. "I have been convinced for a long time that the old flow patterns no longer make sense," Jones told the Herald Examiner. "We live much more informally than we used to. We can't afford servants that would shame us into formal living. Why walk through the front door to your bedroom if the bedroom already has its own 'front door' — a beautiful sliding-glass wall?"

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[Chuck Weiss · Rating 4 out of 5]

The architectural work of modernist A. Quincy Jones is nothing less than astounding, and this book on the Phaidon label shows off his more famous dwellings and office buildings. A wonderful find in our LA County Library System.

[Tarin · Rating 5 out of 5]

The houses I grew up in was designed by this modern architect and the community is featured in this book...so i think it's pretty cool!