PS John, I agree that Shulman made difficult photographic subjects look effortless. I read in one of his obituaries that for some of these shots, many of them taken at dusk, the exposures were done in sections and some of them took 45 minutes to set up, which is not surprising.

I went through that strange conversion to modern architecture too. I would love to see photographs of your folly, if you build it. These things look better when contrasted with older neighbouring buildings anyway. I don’t know the house you’re talking about but can try to find out – anyone know? Also slightly OT, Julius Shulman’s photographs always look somewhat fantastical to anyone from a colder, wetter climate than California’s. From a Vancouver point of view (mine), half of them look like cabanas rather than houses. Shulman photographed all over the States but really his main focus was California, where it’s easier to get away with minimal, simple materials than it is in Vancouver or in England, where I assume you’re writing from. Obviously modernism quite differently here and everything looks more solid, because with insulation and waterproofing, shapes are by necessity much chunkier, eaves and soffits more substantial, windows more serious, deeper shelters over doorways… The California modern houses have such thin, narrow roof lines that sometimes I think they look like line drawings of houses.