Product Description

This new edition of the classic, Building with Nature: Roots of the San Francisco Bay Region Tradition, focuses on the beginnings (1865 and on) of the Bay Area shingle style and Arts & Crafts collaboration in California, and the origins of the trend toward building simple rustic homes in harmony with nature. Freudenheim explores how and why a small, influential group of Californians (including Joseph Worcester, Bernard Maybeck, Charles Keeler, William Keith, Charles Lummis, A. Page Brown, and others)--all of whom had come from the East or from England--were especially devoted to Ruskin and the Arts & Crafts style and how this combined with their dedication to California's natural beauty to create a unique architectural movement.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #232484 in Books
• Published on: 2005-11-01
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Hardcover
• 208 pages

From the Inside Flap
Much has been written about the Arts & Crafts spirit of Californians, their appreciation of the land, their desire to build simple yet interesting houses that connect with the outdoors (sleeping porches, gardens, verandas, terraces, and so on), and their love of natural building materials. This revised edition of a foundation classic focuses on the beginnings (1865 and on) of environmentalism and Arts & Crafts collaboration in California, and the origins of the trend toward building simple rustic homes in harmony with nature. Freudenheim and Sussman explore how and why a small, influential group of Californians (including Joseph Worcester, Bernard Maybeck, Charles Keeler, William Keith, Charles Lummis, A. Page Brown, and others)--all of whom had come from the East or from England--were especially devoted to Ruskin and the Arts & Crafts and how this combined with their dedication to preserve California's natural beauty to create a unique architectural movement. Building with Nature: Development of the California Arts & Crafts Home presents some revolutionary ideas, including exciting new material on the San Francisco Swedenborgian Church, now a National Landmark and considered to be the model for several lines of Mission-style furniture; new information on the architectural development of Russian hill; and the similarities and differences of the almost simultaneous development of the Arts & Crafts movements in England and the Bay Area. Freudenheim examines how Worcester and his circle encouraged less materialism through architecture that complemented a simpler life in tune with nature, and includes letters from Worcester to his cousin, architect Daniel H. Burnham, along with previously unpublished original documents relating to architectural developments in the Bay Area at the turn of the century. Leslie Freudenheim, with coauthor Elisabeth Sussman, did pioneering research on the Arts & Crafts movement and its architectural manifestations in the San Francisco Bay region. This collaboration resulted in the publication of Building with Nature: Roots of the San Francisco Bay Region Tradition (Gibbs Smith, Publisher, 1974). Subsequently, Freudenheim continued her work in architectural history. She wrote a weekly column on architecture and urban affairs for the Baltimore Sun, and contributed to the Washington Post and Museum News. Thereafter she served as Editor of Federal Design Matters for the Design Department, National Endowment for the Arts, and while living in Berlin (1999-2000) wrote on art and architecture for DieWelt and Art News. Since 2001 she has returned to studying the architectural and social roots of the Arts & Crafts movement in California. Freudenheim lives in Washington, D.C. Elisabeth Sussman is a curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art. Her recent exhibitions and catalogues include Eva Hesse: A Retrospective and Diane Arbus: Revelations (both originated at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art). Sussman lives in New York City.

About the Author
Leslie Freudenheim is the coauthor of Building with Nature: Roots of the San Francisco Bay Region Tradition (Gibbs Smith, Publisher, 1974). Freudenheim has continued to work on architectural history and related areas, and has been published in the Baltimore Sun and the Washington Post. She also served as editor of Federal Design Matters for the Design Department, National Endowment for the Arts. Since 2002 she has returned to studying Arts & Crafts homes and the architectural and social roots of this movement.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
In 1967, when Elisabeth Sussman and I began our research into the sources of early California architecture, we joined a small group of pioneers whose work was effectively carving out a new field of American architectural history. Esther McCoy's groundbreaking Five California Architects, Harold Kirker's significant and classic California's Architectural Frontier, David Gebhard's exhibition catalogue Architecture in California 1868-1968, Sally Woodbridge's Buildings of the Bay Region Area, and Roger Olmsted and T. H. Watkins' Here Today-these became the seminal texts in the field. Their precursor, Elisabeth Kendall Thompson's significant article "The Early Domestic Architecture of the San Francisco Bay Region" (1951-52), turned out to be prophetic for us, as Thompson alerted us to the possibility that Reverend Joseph Worcester of the Swedenborgian Church in San Francisco may have played a major role in the architectural development of the region from 1876 to 1915.
It has been enormously gratifying to note the outpouring of further research in the field since we published Building with Nature: Roots of the San Francisco Bay Region Tradition in 1974. Numerous articles and books have advanced the impressive augmentation to our understanding of California's architecture and its role in the Arts & Crafts movement, moving a relatively obscure area of interest into the mainstream of American architectural, intellectual, and social history.
This book contains many new photographs that did not appear in the 1974 book, some of which have not been published since 1902. For example, we have included a view of Joseph Worcester's Russian Hill living room, showing the end with the bay windows that looked over the Golden Gate; Charles F. Lummis published the photograph with an incorrect caption (although he labeled the back of the photo itself properly) so that it remained unrecognized until William Kostura kindly drew my attention to it.

Customer Reviews

Building with Nature: an example of how architectural styles happen
Ms. Freudenheim has provided us with a very well-written book about how new and developing architectureal styles happen, using the SF Bay Area and the development of the Arts and Crafts style as a perfect example. Ms. Freudenheim's excellant research and engaging style shows, in words and photos, how a web of people and buildings continually interact and thus result in a new style. In this greatly expanded edition of a now hard-to-find great original book, we learn about these people, their interactions, and how this resulted in a new archtectural style. This book will be enjoyed by anyone interested in the Arts and Crafts style, either as a home owner, collector, scholar, or as a total observer of the Arts and Crafts movement and it's recent resurgence. Enjoy!

The Art of Arts and Crafts
Leslie Freudenheim has captured an era that has given great beauty to our lives. With grace and wisdom she has presented the San Francisco Bay Area as a landscape filled with the richness of the architectural geniuses who gave the area their distinctive creations. The beauty of the arts and crafts buildings complements nature, and bonds our living spaces into it. The author has, with a great deal of style, significantly enriched our experience of this fine period in our history.

Origins of the "Arts & Crafts" in America
This is the first book to truly explore the origins of the American Arts & Crafts Movement. A group in San Francisco began constructing simpler buildings and furnishing them with what eventually was called Mission furniture. This lead to the nationwide popularization of Craftsman homes and furniture by Stickley and others. If you have an interest in Architecture or the "Arts & Crafts" you should read this book.