Richard Neutra (1892–1970) was an Austrian-American architect who worked for most of his career in Southern California and became one of its leading modernists. Born in Vienna, he studied at the Vienna University of Technology and at Adolf Loos's private school, worked for Erich Mendelsohn in Berlin, and reached the United States by 1923, working briefly for Frank Lloyd Wright before joining his friend Rudolf Schindler in California. He sometimes gave clients detailed questionnaires about how they lived, and wrote books including Survival Through Design (1954). He was awarded the AIA Gold Medal after his death, in 1977.
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The Jardinette Apartments (1928) in Los Angeles were his first American commission. The Lovell Health House (1929) is often described as the first steel-frame house in the United States. For his own home, the VDL Research House (1932), he set out to bring the ideas of the Lovell house to less wealthy clients. The Kaufmann Desert House (1946) in Palm Springs was built for Edgar J. Kaufmann, who had commissioned Fallingwater, and the small Constance Perkins House (1955) in Pasadena was scaled to its owner.
Jardinette Apartments1928 · Los Angeles
VDL Research House1932 · Los Angeles
Kaufmann Desert House1946 · Palm Springs
Lovell Health House1929 · Los Angeles
Arthur and Mona Hofmann House1937 · Hillsborough
Constance Perkins House1955 · Pasadena