Jock Peters, Eleanor LeMaire, and the Modern Department Store

Christopher Long.

Retail design, fashion merchandising, set design, furniture, packaging, interiors, architecture, fine art rendering… little-known architect and designer Jock Peters, a largely forgotten figure of early Los Angeles modernism, did it all. Professor Christopher Long presents his new book titled Jock Peters, Architecture and Design: The Varieties of Modernism by Bauer and Dean Publishers. The book is a visually rich portrait of an architect whose most internationally lauded creations include the lavish commercial interiors for the iconic Bullock’s Wilshire store in Los Angeles and the tragically forgotten Hollander department store in New York City.

Among Peters’s early work in Germany are the Levantehaus and Karstadt department stores, a magnificent glass pavilion from 1916, and his work for Peter Behrens after the war. But, the architect’s most accomplished and compelling work came after 1922 when he settled in Southern California.

Long’s study on early modernism includes material from the architect’s personal archive, still in family hands. The remarkable images in the book—more than 250 historic photographs, etchings, watercolors, and drawings—alongside Long’s narrative, demonstrate how Peters, despite his early death, managed to leave his mark on the modernist landscape in Southern California at a time when the new style was just emerging.

Christopher Long is Martin S. Kermacy Centennial Professor of Architectural History at the University of Texas at Austin. He has published widely on modern architecture and design in Central Europe and the United States.

Join using this Zoom Meeting link:
https://utexas.zoom.us/j/2128132500?pwd=a2ViK2ZMY3BWQ3ZMZjNjZVVZN2pzZz09

Meeting ID: 212 813 2500
Passcode: 90918

A version of this event was originally scheduled for April 18 and April 25; this is the rescheduled event. 

This virtual event is free and open to the public; join using the Zoom link here.