ARTS & ARCHITECTURE 1945-54: The Complete Reprint

Ten years, ten boxes, 118 issues, 6,156 pages!

The seminal architecture journal resurrected in facsimile

The first part (1945-1954) of our facsimile edition of John Entenza's groundbreaking magazine, which launched the Case Study House Program; in ten boxes, each containing one year's worth of magazines

"A&A was instrumental in putting American Architecture on the map."
Julius Shulman

From the end of World War II until the mid-1960s, exciting things were happening in American architecture: emerging talents were focusing on innovative projects that integrated low-cost materials and modern design. This trend was most notably embodied in the famous Case Study House Program, which was championed by the era’s leading American journal, Arts & Architecture. Focusing not only on architecture but also design, art, music, politics, and social issues, A&A was an ambitious and groundbreaking publication, largely thanks to the inspiration of John Entenza, who ran the magazine for over two decades until David Travers became publisher in 1962. The era’s greatest architects were featured in A&A, including Neutra, Schindler, Saarinen, Ellwood, Lautner, Eames, and Koenig; and two of today’s most wildly successful architects, Frank Gehry and Richard Meier, had their debuts in its pages. A&A was instrumental in putting American architecture—and in particular California Modernism—on the map. Other key contributors to the magazine include photographers Julius Shulman and Ezra Stoller, writers Esther McCoy and Peter Yates, and cover designers Herbert Matter and Alvin Lustig, among many luminaries of modernism.

This collection comes with ten boxes, each containing a complete year’s worth of Arts & Architecture magazines from 1945–1954. That’s 6,156 pages in 118 issues reproduced in their entirety—beginning with Entenza’s January 1945 announcement of the Case Study House Program. Also included is a supplement booklet with an original essay by former A&A publisher David Travers, available in English, German, French, and Spanish; plus a master index and tables of contents for the magazine from 1945-1967. Arts & Architecture 1945–1954 will be followed in autumn 2009 by a second set, 1955–1967, bringing together all the existing issues of the modern era.

This new TASCHEN publication, limited to 5,000 numbered copies, provides a comprehensive record of mid-century American architecture and brings the legendary Arts & Architecture back to life after forty years.

The author:
David F. Travers is the former editor and publisher of Arts & Architecture, which he ran from 1963 until 1967. He was a consultant for architects, including The Architects Collaborative, William Pereira, Charles and Ray Eames, and Daniel Mann Johnson & Mendenhall. He was also a founding member of Action for a Better Los Angeles, and served as president of the Architectural Guild at the University of Southern California. He lives in Santa Monica.