Description
Paul R. Williams, Spatial Politics and Civil Rights
Instructor: LeRonn Brooks
Video Description: TBA
Short Description: This course will survey critical moments in the career of renowned architect Paul Revere Williams. In a prolific career spanning almost six decades, Williams, against the backdrop of Jim Crow segregation, designed more than 3,000 structures. Born in Los Angeles in 1894, Williams, an orphan, became a master of Late Moderne design and a range of other architectural styles, from English Tudor to Spanish Colonial and the casual California ranch-style, creating signature structures—even the cursive script that defines the Beverly Hills Hotel is his own handwriting. In 1920, he was appointed to the first Los Angeles City Planning Commission and opened his own practice. He was also licensed as an architect by the State of California in. And in 1923, Williams became the first African American member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA). Along with homes for cele