The Case Study House Program By John Entenza

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The Case Study House program was an idea set up by John Entenza of the Arts and Architecture magazine in 1945 in Los Angeles. It was buoyant during the years of americas post war building boom. The whole idea of the scheme was to tackle the inevitable housing shortage due to the enlargement of major cities. Post war, southern california experienced this growth and industrialisation. As more and more automobiles were being produced more and more freeways were being built, more and more ranch houses. To entenza there seemed to be a failure in creating mass housing by architects so this is what sparked the setup of this program.
Entenza wanted a generation of modern architects to create a low cost, experimental and easily duplicatable house. The …show more content…

While on the waiting list to enter he enlisted in Pasadena City College for two years. USC was the epicenter of any architecture school at the time and thought many ideas of low-cost housing, how to use the new materials available after the war, mass-production and prefabrication. This educational knowledge really gave Koenig the right information that he'd need later in his career. While a student, Koenig shared a design with a studio professor of a steel framed residential house, he rejected the whole idea and to prove him wrong koenig took the plans and built koenig house no.1 in 1950. He proved that not only was it an easy method of construction but it was also at a lower cost. Koenig spent the next couple of years getting involved with different practices. Koenig found most success up to date in 1957, he was licensed, invited to participate in the São Paulo Biennial, and arts and architecture featured one of his designs for a “Low-cost Production House”. His dream of producing “off the shelf” housing as efficiently as automobiles became a lot more realistic when John Entenza invited him to participate in Art and Architecture's Case Study House

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