Following Charles Greene

[Tom Bender]

For a few years I have been working in the Greene & Greene style. I can now construct it reasonably well. But the creativity of Charles Greene will forever exceed my ability. The fun is in trying.

As an engineer I find my work too tightly connected to function. Greene added so much inscrutable content that it makes me stretch out of my usual design mode.

Anyone else on this road?

[Robert Cherry]

I feel the same way. With modern equipment I can execute the designs fairly well but the ability to come up with the design elements, arranged as Charles did, is way beyond my skill set at this point. That ability to walk directly down the line between form and function seems unique to architects- they are half engineer, half artist.

Some of his design choices seem almost a ‘see if you can make this’ challenge to the Hall’s. There is a table, Blacker house if I’m not mistaken, where the curve at the bottom of the leg starts half way up the lower stretcher. This detail is nearly invisible unless you are looking very closely but must have made fitting the tenon shoulders exponentially harder.

[Tom Bender]

Given the volume of creative output in the short span of years (and much of it in weeks or months during a commission) I expect that much came from the Hall's shop.

"Ya ve kin do it, but better"

[Alan Caro]

Tom Bender,

I lived i Pasadena for 5 years, not far from the Gamble House and was a strong Greenite. The mother of a friend of mine moved to Pasadena in 1913 and used to play with the Gamble's children in that house. Years later when the Gamble House had gotten a bit rough the mother asked her childhood playmate about living there and he mentioned that he had never seen the kitchen- only the servants and his mother were allowed in there. < That's a different age for sure.

Every Summer for twenty years, I'd to go to Monterey, Pebble Beach every year and driving up PCH to Carmel, I would often stop at the James House. This is still for me among the most beautiful houses in the World an dI'd certainly rather live there than Fallingwater. When it was still i the hands of the original owner, I was standing by the front wall and Randell Makinson, who wrote the G&G book drove up. I was allowed onto the grounds and I took 150 slides. Makinson then invited me to visit Charles Greene's studio in Carmel, which he built after separating his practice from Henry's. That was a treat. At Charles Greene's studio Makinson showed me Greene's pencil sketches on the carved interiors doors. He was never finished, never satisfied.

In my view, Charles was the more artistic of the brothers and was prone to improvisation and experimentation for effect. As you may know, the James House was designed entirely by Charles and was under construction a long time- 1914 to 1931. Charles Greene was said to have been there every minute and directed the placement of every stone. if a wall went wrong, he'd have it all ripped out and do ir again. It qualifies as sculpture- fantastically growing out of the cliff organically.

Over a period of thirty-five years, I designed quite a number of houses in CA and did several projects that were Craftsman influenced, using bits from G&G, Mackintosh, Olbrich, early Wright, Voysey, and Lutyens. Here's a house on Venice Beach, Los Angeles that's a bit Makintoshian:

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A house in Malibu under the influence of Lutyens:

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The entry tower and gate to a house in Brentwood, CA

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That gate was made, including forging the iron, by Tom Braverman, a fantastic furniture maker and wood carver, now working in Hawaii. He also made a 13' X 4' dining table for that house in which the top was a single piece of Walnut. He used to chose the trees in Oregon, had them cut and milled, and air dried the planks for eight years. That table top had 150 fillet inlays- beautifully done.

I liked Craftsman furniture- G&G, early Wright, and Makintosh. A couple of years ago, I worked on a clock case, with a lighted interior, intended to be made by CNC and the face cut by laser:

Clock_Time and Tide_Grid Face_SM_MOD2 FL 2 Hi Bg_vray 1_11.23.13.jpg

My niece and family bought a rambling 1913 house in Vermont - 3/4 Craftsman and I heartily approve.

Charles Greene was special in the pantheon of Arts and Crafts, as he worked very personally on each component. Wright, Voysey, and Mackintosh as well, and the James House is a striking masterpiece.

By the way, Makinson told me that when he was an architecture student at USC, he happened upon a yard sale and it was on the laen of the Blacker House and he bought a large table fro $125. Later on, there was an owner in the 80's who bought the Blacker House when Craftsman had a revival and started selling the fixtures and furniture fro large sums. A crime and he was stopped by laws protecting historical buildings.

Alan

[Stan Calow]

Tom, this is what I've wondered: what is the fundamental principle of G&G design that makes it different? Is it exposed joinery and end grain? Is the purpose of the non-functional details like the oversized fingers, cloudlifts and ebony plugs, to draw attention to, or away from the look of the joinery?

[Tom Bender]

Alan
Thanks so much for sharing. I'm sure you can answer Stan's question better than I, but I may get a start on it.

[Tom Bender]

Stan
It's more than a single principal or a collection of innovative details, though those details are certainly part of it. It is the combination of many talents and circumstances in one time and place that made it possible for the details and quality to develop. Charles was an exceptional artist. He leapt far ahead of the current arts and crafts movement. He was empowered to do so much by his brother and the Halls. There were several very wealthy customers who wanted this level of art and craftsmanship. Well that's my first blush. There are several good books on the subject. Those authors are much better with ideas and words.

[Stan Calow]

Tom, thanks for reply. I do have some of those books on G&G because I'm very interested. In your original post you mentioned how you were too closely tied to function. I'm trying to understand how and why they bridged that space between form and function so differently than others. Deciding to deliberately expose the finger joints on a drawer front is pretty daring, while how they softened the extended fingers is the brilliant touch. So why did they do it in the first place?

The favorite thing I learned from them is the housed tenon - adds strength, while concealing the glue line. Great thinking.

[Edwin Santos]

Alan or Tom,
Is there a story behind the Asian influences in the G&G designs? Did either of the brothers spend time in Asia?

Edwin,

[Alan Caro]

Edwin Santos,

Craftsman design was derived out of the British Arts and Crafts aesthetic movement by 19th C. historians' /theorists such as Ruskin, Pugin and Morris which focused on hand craftsmanship, lack of ornament, and venacular - untrained design. There was some influence by the Pre-Raphaelite painters who eschewed perspective as decadent. Their inspiration centered on traditional Japanese architecture and the Japanese paintings- no perspective. The influence concentrated on the simple geometric forms, that expressed the structure, avoided decorative moldings, and emphasized the horizontal:

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I think the similarities of Craftsman to the above cabinets are clear. Wright was especially influenced by the unadorned and horizontal qualities. Wright also was a collector and dealer in Japanese prints, after having done the Imperial Hotel project in Japan:




And Stickley was under these same influences. Voysey looked for traditional English motifs, but the underlying simplicity /geometric emphasis, lack of moldings, etc, were tied to Arts and Crafts and refined by Japanese design.

A big subject!

Alan

[Edwin Santos]

Alan,
Thank you for that insight. The history and context within which these styles evolved is very interesting. It's especially interesting that artists, theorists, writers, architects saw in Japanese design the ideals that were being embraced in the literary period of Romanticism and the Arts and Crafts movement. Good stuff!
Edwin,

[Tom Bender]

At the time, Asian crafts were highly evolved after centuries of gradual change. There were old old examples to guide and measure against. European traditions are far more turbulent, with inspiration coming from many corners of the world. European and especially American crafts remain less developed so Asian influences have the power of refinement.

[Edwin Santos]

Tom,
Good points, and what I find worthy of some more study (for me) is the Mingei movement that took hold in Japan at around the same time as the Arts and Crafts movement in the UK and US. What I don't quite know is whether one gave rise to the other or whether they happened to coincide independently. Maybe the Mingei movement was already underway and the Arts & Crafts disciples saw in it the manifestation of the design ideals they were pursuing. What's clear is both movements shared philosophical features such as a focus on practical items used in daily living, abandonment of excessive adornment, the importance of the craftsman. There's a Mingei museum in San Diego which I hope to visit and learn more.

Wouldn't it have been something to listen to the design meetings between the Greenes and the Halls? As much as Charles Greene's genius is undeniable, you'd have to believe a certain amount of input came from the Halls as craftsman collaborating in the process, and their design input seems far less documented.