Dallas’s modernist masterpieces are celebrated in a new book

Despite the romantic allure of the hackneyed Dallas caricature—ten-gallon hats, big hair, oil derricks churning money on the lawns of debauched neoclassical mansions—there’s another side to life in the fabled Texas city that is equally seductive. Dallas Modern ($68), a new book by the Dallas Architecture Forum, chronicles the city’s love affair with modernist architecture and design through the lens of 20 extraordinary houses that span the years 1951 to 2013.

Many of the architects who appear in the compendium are luminaries of 20th- and 21st-century design. Philip Johnson is represented by the Beck House (1963), a dazzling tour de force of colonnaded craziness, returned to useful life after an eight-year renovation by the design firm Bodron + Fruit. Oak Court, a home conceived by Edward Durell Stone at the time the architect was working on the U.S. Embassy in Delhi (1956–58), features original T. H. Robsjohn-Gibbings furniture set against a backdrop of glass walls and fanciful brises-soleil. Of course, Richard Meier’s famed Rachofsky House (1996)—a machine for embracing art as much as living—has also made the cut.

Perhaps even more intriguing are exemplary houses created by successive generations of Texas modern architects, including Gary Cunningham, Lionel Morrison, and Enslie (Bud) Oglesby. And because no great home can be truly great without spectacular interiors, Dallas Modern also highlights the work of David Cadwallader, Emily Summers, and other designers who have helped preserve and enrich these architectural treasures.

Tour Dallas’s stunning modern architecture.

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