Word: banham
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...Banham is plainly smitten by Los Angeles and its laissez-faire ways, the love is based on understanding. To discover the city's true dynamics, he studied old deeds, maps, reports and above all the enduring visual record of buildings set in stucco, wood and glass. In the process, he even learned to drive...
...finds that the city's psyche took form in the 1880s, when the first waves of midwestern farmers arrived by the trainload. What they sought in L.A. was not urbanity but a continuation of their dispersed, self-reliant way of life. Thus, Banham says, "Los Angeles is the Middle West raised to the flashpoint, the authoritarian dogmas of the Bible Belt and the perennial revolt against them colliding at critical mass under the palm trees. Out of it comes a cultural situation where only the extreme is normal." To reinforce that pattern, Hollywood bloomed in the 1920s, adding...
...turn, the people were shaped by the city's topography. To the west lies the splendor of 70 continuous miles of white sandy beaches. This coastline enhances transcendental (as opposed to commercial) values. Says Banham: "A man needs only what he stands up in-usually a pair of frayed shorts and sunglasses." In contrast are the foothills, where grand houses perch precariously on steep, lush gardens, the perfect incubators of the "fat life" of affluence and privacy...
Glorious Spontaneity. Between ocean and mountain stretches the broad, featureless plain whose uninspired development Banham calls "Anywheresville/ Nowheresville." But soon freeways stamped man's imprint on this heartland too. Each great road had the potential to become "a work of art, both as a pattern on the map, as a monument against the sky, and as a kinetic experience." Of course, the roads bred more cars, and cars bred what Banham calls "a coherent state of mind." One symptom: the emphasis on driving everywhere, a "willing acquiescence in an incredibly demanding man/machine system." Another: the customized...
...Banham sees it, Los Angeles' hall-mark is a glorious spontaneity. Certainly the city fostered a self-confident new architecture unlike any other elsewhere. A good example is Simon Rodia's famous Watts towers, which are "unlike anything else in the world." A true Southern California building recognizes the outdoors to such an extent that it has five entrances, Banham notes, "none of which is the main one." He also celebrates the riot of commercial structures that have sprouted under the hot sun like exotic weeds: restaurants shaped like hats, milk cans or owls, and squat concrete structures...