Reyner Banham examined the built environment of Los Angeles in a
way no architectural historian before him had done, looking with
fresh eyes at its manifestations of popular taste and industrial
ingenuity, as well as its more traditional modes of residential and
commercial building. His construct of "four ecologies"
examined the ways Angelenos relate to the beach, the freeways, the
flatlands, and the foothills. Banham delighted in this mobile city
and identified it as an exemplar of the posturban future.
"The true language of Los Angeles is the language of movement, says Banham. 'So . . . I learned to drive in order to read Los Angeles in the original.' . . . A generous and exhilarating joyride."-Roger Jellinek, The New York Times
Reyner Banham (1922-1988) was Sheldon H. Solow Professor of the History of Architecture at the Institute of Fine Arts, New York University. Joe Day leads deegan day design llc and serves on the design faculty at the Southern California Institute of Architecture.
