my design fix

Julius Shulman (1910 – 2009)

Photo: Dan Winters

“What good is a dream house if you haven’t got a dream?” -Julius Shulman

Just a few months shy of his 99th birthday, Julius Shulman, the photographer famous for his iconic photos of modern homes and a glamorous post-war Los Angeles, died at his home in L.A. on Wednesday the 15th of August.

His love and  respect for Modernist architecture, his amazing photos and his contagiously charming personality led him to be a well respected champion of the modernist architecture movement.

Shulman’s architectural photography career began by chance at the young age of 26 when his photos of an incomplete house designed by Richard Neutra impressed the architect so much that he offered him money for them and invited him to take more. This talent for photography not only launched his own career but arguably the careers of many of the period’s most famous architects such as Rudolph Schindler, Pierre Koenig, John Lautner, Eero Saarinen, Charles and Ray Eames, and Raphael Soriano (who designed Shulman’s own house, which he lived in for decades.)

His work, whether in black and white or colour, was never just about composition and light. It was about lifestyle. He was the first architectural photographer to plant men, women, and children like props inside buildings.

 Photo: Genaro Molina

Above is a photo of Julius Shulman at work photographing the now famous Stahl House (Case Study House #22) and below is a link to a short video of Julius talking about his most famous  photograph that could easily be said to be the signature image of 1960’s Los Angeles.

For a great article that gives an insight into the life of the charming, brilliant, and cantankerous architectural photographer in 36 exposures visit the LAmag website here.