Celebrating late modern architecture in California — and Dallas

If you were to make a list of things that are despised by a certain type of cultural snob, Los Angeles and late modern architecture would both be at the top. That’s nonsense, of course, and a new monograph, Wayne Thom: Photographing the Late Modern (Monacelli, $ 60) can dispel both prejudices at once.

Thom made it his art to photograph the crisp, glassy images, most of which were created in-house and produced in California from the 1960s to the 1980s. His sense of the sky, of colors and reflections, gave a class of work considered soulless, but now re-evaluated, visual drama, but also humanity and humor.

1/6This almost surreal picture of the 1971 CNA tower in Los Angeles is perhaps Wayne Thom’s most famous photo, which has as vivid a feel for the city as a Magic Johnson fast break party or Randy Newman singing its praises.

2/6Thom captures the dizzying rooms inside John Portman’s 1977 Hotel Bonaventure, a favorite of Hollywood directors and fans of architectural complexity alike.

3/6The 1988 Mitsubishi headquarters of Kajima International in Cypress, California.

4/6Thom was hired regularly to document the Californian work of the architectural giant SOM, including this 1977 data center for Bank of America in San Francisco, where his sense of color and shape is underlined by the figure of a young woman.

5/6Wayne Thom, who drove up in Northern California in 1976.

6/6Wayne Thom: Photographing the Late Modern, edited by Monacelli Press, 2021.

Late modern in Dallas

Dallas is shaped by this late modern era, and architecture critic Mark Lamster was inspired by Thom’s photographs and visited some of the formative works of that time that still shape the city today.

1/4The golden facades of the Campbell Center, the emblem of glowing bars, were reflected in themselves. The original building was designed in 1972 by Neuhaus and Taylor of Houston, the second five years later by HKS of Dallas.

2/4Nothing says Dallas like the Hyatt, which is attached to the Reunion Tower, though it’s better known for its mirrored exterior. It’s just as dramatic inside, with a towering atrium in the style of John Portman, although the architect was actually Welton Becket from Los Angeles.

3/4The Stemmons Towers complex, a campus of clear towers that are defined by their exposed concrete structural system, was the work of Harwell Hamilton Harris, one of the leading architects of the time, but who is best known for his residential work. Today they are mostly empty, a concern of monument preservationists and architects, who rightly admire the buildings for their sensitive arrangement and bold design.

4/4With its stepped and gridded facade, St. Paul Place is a cool piece of late modernism, best known for its main tenant: “D Magazine”. The design came from the Canadian architects with radio station WZMH, who had a significant presence in Dallas at the time. Her work included the 1700 nearby Pacific Tower on Ervay.

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