USModernist Radio - Architecture You Love

Michael Hammond is co-founder and Editor in Chief of World Architecture News (WAN). He chairs the WAN AWARDS jury panel and produces the topical series of podcasts, Shop Talk which has featured many of the world's leading architects over its 100+ programmes to date.  Prior to WAN, Michael spent 25 years in construction project management before taking up writing; he authored Performing Architectur...

Craig Dykers , at just 28 years old, received international acclaim after winning the $350 million commission for the Library of Alexandria in Egypt .  He is founder of the design firm Snøhetta , with offices in Oslo Norway and New York , architect for some of the most amazing modern buildings in the world.  Snøhetta is the design architect for the James B. Hunt Jr. Library at NC State University....

Aidan Buehler is 14 years old. He's an eighth grader in Chapel Hill NC with an interest in drafting.  What he did next is remarkable.  Instead of just piddling around on his computer like most kids, he contacted Chapel hill architect Lucy Carol Davis to be his mentor on a school-wide design competition.  Aidan's house was one of the most elaborate projects.  According to his interview with the New...

Nathanial Kahn is a director and producer.  He is also the son of architect Louis Kahn , one of the most influential architects of the 20th century.  In 2003, he produced the Oscar-nominated film My Architect about the life and work of his dad, interviewing people who knew Kahn including Frank Gehry, Philip Johnson, and I.M. Pei.  Kahn created modern buildings with the feel and presence of ancient...

Eames Demetrios is the grandson (and namesake) of Charles and Ray Eames and leads the Eames brand which has roared back into the public eye.  His mission is communicating, preserving and extending the brilliant work of designers Charles and Ray Eames who were best known by the public for their furniture and for their 125 short films, including the much-heralded-and-still-relevant Powers of Ten.  ...

California i nterior designer Brad Dunning grew up in Memphis and LA. He has early, wilder roots in the LA punk rock scene as part of the original Gun Club, a seminal noisy punk/blues band.  Widely praised as designer to the stars such as Tom Ford, Sofia Coppola, and Demi Moore,  Brad has been featured in Architectural Digest and created a look the magazine calls Cocktail Modern. Plus, he helped r...

The world's largest erector set:  the Lustron was a house you put together with a screwdriver.  It was metal, yet would never rust.  It was ingeniously heated and insulated.  It came on a truck ready for assembly.  A brilliant design produced only a few years after WWII, the Lustron now has a cult following to repair and preserve them -- or assemble ones long in storage. Author Tom Fetters is King...

Landscape architect Susan Saarinen , daughter of architect Eero Saarinen , granddaughter of architect Eliel Saarinen   (pronounced sahrr -uh-nen) , and Raymond Neutra , retired physician and epidemiologist in California, son of architect Richard Neutra (pronounced noy -tra). In the 1950's when the general public really didn't pay much attention to architects, Richard Neutra and Eero Saarinen were...

Justin Shubow is President of the National Civic Art Society , a Washington DC educational non-profit for the classical and humanistic tradition in public art and architecture.  With a background in law, philosophy, comedy, and physics, his sharp wit informs and entertains through articles in Forbes and appearances before Congress and various Washington committees. We talk about Frank Gehry's desi...

Paul Rudolph was not as well-known as Frank Lloyd Wright but he designed some of the most fascinating and creative Modernist buildings in America. While inspiring a generation of architects, the public generally does not warm to his large brutalist designs, finding the intense use of concrete and steel to be ugly and oppressive.  But hey, we love 'em, and today we welcome two passionate and willin...

Sarah Susanka is an internationally-known architect and author of the best-selling "Not So Big" series of books, which kicked off with The Not So Big House in 1997.  Over the years, she has been featured on Oprah, Charlie Rose, and many architecture and design publications.  She lives in Raleigh, North Carolina. Monique Lombardelli is a San Francisco filmmaker, CEO, Realtor, and developer. She pro...

Joe Kwon is the cellist for the internationally acclaimed band The Avett Brothers.  He's the client of Robby Johnston and Craig Kerins , principals in the design/build firm Raleigh Architecture & Raleigh Construction.  Block by block, they are developing a stretch of Raleigh's downtown into small, sustainable, walkable Modernist houses.  Joe's recently built house is the third in what will be abou...

Ever since Modernist houses hit the mainstream market in the 1950's, the real estate community has largely stayed away. Unaware of history, contemptuous of design style, and overreacting to certain flaws, realtors can do more to scare buyers away than to close the deal. Two Modernist realtors keep it real about these livable works of art. Crosby Doe is one of the leading Modernist realtors in Amer...

Imagine buying a lot, designing a house, getting all the neighborhood and city approvals, starting construction, then - boom - your neighbor sues to stop construction.  Here's the background.   Y ou'll hear one couple's incredible story - and how it attracted worldwide coverage. Louis Cherry has been an architect since 1983 and is principal of a design/build practice focusing on modern residential...

J ohn Morris is a Usability Engineer by day but by night he's the Batman of downtown architecture documenting buildings in Chicago and Raleigh. He's also a superfan of Modernist architect Milton Small Jr., student of Mies Van der Rohe.   Although Small died in 1992, his firm lived on through Small's son Milton Small III of Small Kane Architects.  We'll talk with John and Milton about the man they...

Author J. Michael Welton writes about architecture, art, and design for national and regional publications such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, Dwell, and Architectural Record. His new book is "Drawing from Practice: Architects and the Meaning of Freehand." One of the architects featured in the book is Jim Cutler, Seattle-area architect well-known for his work in s...

Christine Madrid French is one of America's foremost experts on Modernist preservation. She is co-founder of the Recent Past Preservation Network (the first Modernist preservation organization) and served as President for nine years. She pretty much knows everything modern from Bauhaus to Bob's Big Boy. We'll hear her brave, decade-long attempt to save the Modernist icon of Richard Neutra's Cyclor...

Although actress Kelly Lynch appeared in Drugstore Cowboy, Roadhouse, Charlie's Angels, and the swanky Miami TV series Magic City, we love her movies about Modernist preservation.  She's also got two killer Modernist houses in Los Angeles. Myrick Howard has been President since 1978 of Preservation North Carolina, the state's premier preservation organization, and knows how to keep these works of...