Casa Malaparte is a house on the Isle of Capri which sits on a cliff 32 metres above the sea overlooking the Gulf of Salerno. it was designed in 1937 by Adalberto Libera for the italian writer & journalist Curzio Malaparte. in 1963 the house was used in Le Mépris, a film by Jean-Luc Godard starring Brigitte Bardot.
this project by benjamin critten …
… immediately made me think of this house
which was used as the basis for the house in charlie’s angels. do you remember? sam rockwell was wooing drew barrymore up until he revealed himself to be the bad guy and put her through a window…
and even after the fact i still wanted her to end up with him, because sam rockwell is awesome!
… anyway, one of the houses benjamin critten mentions in the publication is jackie treehorn’s place in the big lebowski (i can’t think of jackie treehorn without remembering that note he scribbled, makes me giggle every time.)
this is the sheats goldstein residence, which was designed by the same architect who was responsible for the chemosphere – john lautner.
the same house was incidentally also used in bandits (a completely underappreciated movie, in my opinion)
another of the films mentioned in the publication is diamonds are forever, which was partly filmed in the elrod house, designed by (you guessed it) john lautner.
AND he mentions twilight (not the silly vampire one) – which uses the jacobsen residence, also by lautner.
he also designed the house from a single man, which i was perving over a while back
not that anyone in the single man was particularly evil.
thus, my conclusion is that if i had to live in a movie i would want to be the bad guy because they are invariably the raddest characters and they get to live in the nicest houses.
this house is totally a case of oooooh i love the interior, but blegh why did they have to put that white block in the middle of a street filled with pretty old houses? really? way to ruin the neighbourhood guys.
i can hear my dad in the back of my mind saying, no sense of place. with a disappointed shake of his head… and i’d have to agree! but i can appreciate the interior at least.
discussion is welcome, i’m sure opinions will be divided on this. via contemporist.
the house from a single man is still up for sale, by the way. just in case you were on the market and you wanted to spend in the region of $1,5 million (or less? i mean, in the current climate…) – this would be a good buy. designed in 1948 by john lautner; it is an open plan living masterpiece made from redwood, concrete and glass which opens up to the oak forest that surrounds it. heaven?
i already expressed my love for old school victoriana houses – but this is the flip side of the coin. i can definitely see myself being very comfortable in a mid-century modern house, especially since i grew up in one – i love an expanse of glass and open living areas. julius schulman was a well known architectural photographer from that era, and his imagery certainly makes me appreciate these buildings even more.
