QUALITY BUDGET HOUSES
A Treasury of 100 Architect-Designed Houses
from $5,000 to $20,000
Katherine Morrow Ford and Thomas H. Creighton
Katherine Morrow Ford and Thomas H. Creighton: QUALITY BUDGET HOUSES [A Treasury Of 100 Architect-Designed Houses From $5,000 To $20,000]. New York: Reinhold, 1954. First edition. Quarto. Dark green paper covered boards with quarter cloth titled in gold. Photo illustrated dust jacket. 224 pp. 350 black and white photographs, diagrams, and floorplans. Jacket lightly rubbed with mild nicking and wear to edges. A nice copy: a very good copy in a very good dust jacket.
8.25 x 10.5 hardcover book with 224 pages and 350 black and white photographs, diagrams, and floorplans profiling 100 postwar American Architect-designed houses! This book is a veritable Bible for people interested in postwar modernism that was produced under (often severe) budget constraints. No Kaufmann Houses here -- just thoughtfully planned and brilliantly executed modern housing.
This book spotlights some of the more buget-counscious, lesser-known structures of the period, thus supplying a more unique perspective than simlar volumes that tend to showcase the iconic residences.
Eichler Alert: An Eicheler Home in Palo Alto by Frederick Emmons and A. Quincy Jones is profiled on three pages with cost facts, materials, 5 black and white photos, and a floor plan. Too cool! Excellent vintage contemporary interior photography by Julius Shulman, Ezra Stoller, Bill Hedrich-Blessing, Joseph Molitor, Marvin Rand and others.
- YOUR BUDGET AND YOUR HOUSE: How to face the facts of life about low-budget building.
- THE SITE: How to economize on the land you buy (eight case studies).
- USE OF SPACE: How to save on the space in your house (fourteen case studies).
- EXPANSION: How to build a house that will expand (fourteen case studies.
- STRUCTURE: How to save on your construction system (fourteen case studies).
- MATERIALS AND EQUIPMENT: How to save on the building products you use (fourteen case studies).
- READY-BUILT HOUSES: How to buy quality within your budget (nine case studies).
- COOPERATIVES: How to save by building with others (ten case studies).
- THE OWNER AS A BUILDER: How to save through your own work (twelve case studies).
- THE ARCHITECT - THE BUILDER: How to use fully the talents of each (five case studies).
- Index
This book contains extensive documentation of the following projects: GREGORY AIN (with Joseph Johnson and Alfred Day) - Avondale Development Co., Mar Vista, Calif. ; THE ARCHITECTS COLLABORATIVE, Five Fields Housing Group, Lexington, Mass. WILLIAM BECKETT, Shoor house, Los Angeles, Calif.; ARTHUR T. BROWN, Dow house, Tucson, Ariz.; CAMPBELL & WONG, Campbell house, Mill Valley, Calif.; ALFRED-CLAUSS, JANE WEST - Clauss house, Wallingford, Pa.; ALEXANDER S. COCHRAN, Ecklund house, Woodbridge, Conn.; W. DANFORTH COMPTON, Brown house, South Burlington, Vt.; MARIO CORBETT, Payne house, San Francisco, Calif.; CURTIS & DAVIS - Page house, New Orleans, La. Shushan house, Little Farms, La.; DEWITT & SWANK - Bearden house, Dallas, Tex.; DRAKE, BLAINE - Connor house, Phoenix, Ariz.; GORDON DRAKE - "Unit House", Alameda County, Calif.; ROBERT ELKINGTON, Hedrick house, St. Charles, Mo. & Koestering house, Kirkwood, Mo.; EDWARD ELLIOTT, Roosevelt house, Birmingham, Mich.; CRAIG ELLWOOD, Hale house, Beverly Hills, Calif.; FEHR & GRANGER, Sneed house, Austin, Tex.; JASON FLATOW, MAX-MOORE, Book house, Albuquerque, N. M. & Moore house, Albuquerque, N. M.; FREEMAN - FRENCH-FREEMAN, Ryan house, Shelburne, Vt.; BURKET E. GRAF, Clarke house, Beatrice, Neb.; CARL GRAFFUNDER, GrafJunder house, Minneapolis, Minn.; CONRAD E. GREEN, Crosby house, North Kingstown, R. I.; ROBERT A. GREEN, Clune house, Tarrytown, N. Y.; VICTOR GRUEN, Rubin house, West Los Angeles, Calif.; HAMMEL & GREEN, Strong house, Alefandria, Minn.; HENRY HEBBELN, Dusenbury house, Tryon, N. C.; DAVID T. HENKEN, Anderson house, Pleasantville, N. Y., Brody house, Pleasantville, N. Y., Hein house, Thornwood, N. Y., Henken house, Pleasantville, N. Y., Masson house, Pleasantville, N. Y., Silver house, Pleasantville, N. Y.; DON HERSHEY, Brown house, Pittsford, N. Y. Photos: Robert Brown; HENRY HILL, Blaisdell house, Berkeley, Calif., Brennan house, Oakland, Calif.; CALEB HORNBOSTEL, Wollman house, Hackensack, N. J.; E. H. HUNTER, Moulton house, Htmover, N. H.; JONES, A. QUINCY, JR.- EMMONS, FREDERICK E., Eichler Houses, Inc., Palo Alto, Calif.; WILLIAM V. KAESER, Melvin house, Madison, Wis.; GEORGE FRED and WILLIAM KECK, Whitehorn house, Northville, Mich.; BERNARD KESSLER, Golbin house, North Bennington, Vt.; KEYES, SMITH & SATTERLEE (see also Satterlee, Nicholas), Luria Bros. "Holmes Run," Arlington, Va. ; PAUL HAYDEN KIRK, Kirk house, Seattle, Wash. ; ERNEST J. KUMP, Barrett & Hilp Development, Redwood City, Calif.; LEAGUE, WARREN & RILEY, League house, Macon, Ga.; ROGER LEE, Hersey house, Paradise, Calif.; LUDERS & SASAKI, Vance house, Monticello, Ill.; GEORGE MATSUMOTO, Richter house, Raleigh, N. C.; WILLNER & MILLKEY MOSCOWITZ, Millkey house, Atlanta, Ga.; NORMAN C. NAGLE, Cedarleaf house, Washington County, Minn..; GEORGE NAKASHIMA, Nakashima house, New Hope, Pa.; RICHARD J. NEUTRA, Bailey house, Pacific Palisades, Calif. & Hinds house, Los Angeles, Calif. & Rourke house, Beverly Hills, Calif.; RAMEY & HIMES, Buskirk house, Augusta, Kan. & Wolff house, Wichita, Kan.; JOHN RIDLEY, Brooks house, Bainbridge Island, Wash. & Leisy house, The Uplands, Wash. & Panchot house, Seattle, Wash.; ROBERT HAYS ROSENBERG, Rosenberg house, East Hampton, L. I., N. Y.; PAUL RUDOLPH (see also Twitchell & Rudolph), Walker guest house, Sanibel Island, Fla.; JAN RUHTENBERG, ADC Skyway Development, Colorado Springs, Colo.; NICHOLAS SATTERLEE (see also Keyes, Smith & Satterlee), Shaffer house, Fairfax, Va.; SCHWEIKHER & ELTING, Harring house, Highland Park, Ill.; ABEL SORENSON, Greenwood house, Woodstock, N. Y. ; STADELMAN, RICHARD R., Stadelman house, Las Vegas, Nev.;EUGENE D. STERNBERG, Araphoe Acres Development, Denver, Colo. & Sternberg house, Denver, Colo.; EDWARD D. STONE, Builder house, Montauk Point, L.I., N.Y.; HUGH STUBBINS, JR., Aiken house, Hingham Mass.; & Morgan house, Lincoln, Mass. ; EDGAR TAFEB, GaiJin house, New Bedford, Mass.; TAYLOR, CROMBIE-ABATA, GYO, Dustin house, LaGrange, Ill.; TAYLOR, CROMBIE-TAGUE, ROBERT BRUCE, Nuger house, Elmwood Park, Ill.; THORSHOV & CERNY, Jensen house, Minnetonka Mills, Minn.; TWENTY-ONE ACRES ARCHITECTURAL BOARD, Fisher house, Ardsley, N.Y. & Freedman house, Ardsley, N.Y. & Ullman house, Ardsley, N. Y.; TWITCHELL & RUDOLPH (see also Paul Rudolph), Wheelan guest cottages, Sarasota, Fla.; ELROY WEBBER, Whitcomb house, Somerset County, N.J.; BOLTON WHITE, JACK HERMANN, Ancker house, Sausalito, Calif.; WURSTER, BERNARDI & EMMONS, Davison house, Fresno, Calif., Emmons house, Mill Valley, Calif. & Killen house, Los Gatos, Calif.
From the book: “This is a book about the things you have to know - and the things you have to do-to get a good, well designed and well built house on a limited budget. It tries to be a realistic book because the authors believe you are not interested in fantasy or wishful thinking. Let us suppose that you want a house of your own. You have been talking about it and dreaming about it and have saved a great file of clippings from magazines. But you can not make up your mind, in the first place, whether you can afford it and whether it is wise; in the second place, you can't decide where to turn for advice and how to go about the preliminary steps of looking and comparing and studying.”
“Perhaps there is some money put away in the bank, and your credit is good for a reasonable sort of mortgage arrangement. The family income also may be secure, and the prospects for increases may be practically guaranteed. And yet you wonder if it would be foolish to obligate yourselves for a heavy monthly payment for years to come and to borrow to the point where sleep might be lost worrying about it. How big a budget does one really need for the sort of house we want, you ask yourselves? How about these houses some of the magazines show that Paul and Paulette built for a song, doing most of the work themselves on the weekends? Is that really possible? All of the beautiful things that have gone into the scrapbook must have cost their owners a lot of money. Perhaps you have heard stories about families who got in deeper than they realized-who found that extras appeared, that bids were not accurate, and that prices rose. You know perfectly well you would not want to risk the capital you have so painstakingly piled up in the savings account in that way.”