Docomomo US/Hawaii has been instrumental in bringing attention to and advocacting for Hawaii's unique modern heritage through programming and events. From tours to lectures and talks stories to advocating for threatened properties, see what the chapter has been up to in 2017.
Think Tech: Hawaii’s Global Future
Tonia Moy, AIA, President of Docomomo US/Hawaii recently joined Martin Despang, host of Human(e) Architecture, to introduce the organization’s ambitions and aspirations of documenting and conserving the unique midcentury modern architecture in Hawaii.
Watch the discussion HERE.
Docomomo US/Hawaii Talk Story: Douglas Snelling
Visiting architectural historian Davina Jackson and Sydney-based author of Douglas Snelling: Pan-Pacific Modern Design and Architecture (2017) talked about Snelling’s work at a recent gathering of the Docomomo US/Hawaii Chapter. Douglas Burrage Snelling (1916-1985), a forerunner of the ‘indigenous modernism’ movement, was a glamorous English-Australasian architect and designer who built some of Sydney’s major Wrightian residences of the 1950s and 1960s, and then retired to Honolulu in 1977.
Strongly inspired by two visits to Los Angeles in 1937 and 1947, Snelling interpreted California’s ‘good-life modernism’ via Wright’s younger successors Richard Neutra, Harwell Hamilton Harris and Gordon Drake, and worked briefly with John Lautner, who helped him design the southern hemisphere’s first infinity pool. The talk covered Snelling’s pan-Pacific career from birth in England to adulthood in New Zealand, his two working stints in Hollywood, his successful design and architecture career in Sydney, schemes for resorts and houses across the South Pacific, retirement to Hawai‘i and role as a Cambodian diplomat.
