Reginald Davis Johnson

Santa Barbara Post Office (93101). Reginald Johnson, architect, 1936. Commissioned as part of the New Deal

Reginald Davis Johnson (1882 - 1952) was an American architect. His practice, based in Pasadena, California, focused on the Los Angeles area and southern California in general, with a mixture of residential and commercial work. Johnson's later work was influenced by his progressive ideas on housing policy.

Johnson was born in New York state on July 19, 1882, the son of Joseph Horsfall Johnson, who would become the first Episcopal bishop of Los Angeles from 1896 to 1928. Johnson studied architecture in Paris and then attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, graduating in 1910 and returned to Pasadena. His father would consecrate St. Paul's Cathedral in Los Angeles in 1924, designed by Reginald.^[1] Johnson made a good living in the 1920s designing houses in Montecito and Pasadena. Johnson made his name by designing houses for the rich, but also designed more affordable housing, a cause that assumed greater importance to him as the Great Depression wore on. In 1931 Johnson won an award for best design for a small house, receiving the award from Herbert Hoover. Johnson designed Rancho San Pedro for Los Angeles as a public housing project in 1939. Through the 1930s Johnson worked on the design of Baldwin Hills Village in Los Angeles, which was designed as an up-to-date community of inexpensive housing. Johnson collaborated with Clarence Stein, the planner of Radburn, New Jersey.^[2]

Works

• Ranch San Carlos, the estate belonging to the Jackson family in Montecito, California (1929) ^[3]
• Bellosguardo, the summer home of Huguette Clark and her mother, Anna LaChapelle Clark, in Santa Barbara (1933)^[4]
• Saint Saviour's Chapel (Harvard-Westlake School) (1914)
• Good Samaritan Hospital, Los Angeles, replaced 1976
• Santa Barbara Country Club ("Miraflores") (1909, rebuilt 1913, altered 1915 by Reginald D. Johnson) now the Music Academy of the West^[5][6]
• Flintridge Riding Club^[7]
• All Saints Episcopal Church, Pasadena (1923)
• St. Paul's Cathedral, Los Angeles (1924), demolished 1979^[1]
• Hale Solar Laboratory and Solar Observatory, Pasadena (1924) (NHL)
• Santa Barbara Biltmore Hotel (1927)
• Cate School (1928–29)^[8]
• Santa Barbara Post Office (1937)
• Tanglewood (Lotusland), Santa Barbara (1919), remodeled by George Washington Smith
• Baldwin Hills Village (1932)^[2]

References

1. Stoltz, Eric. "Cathedral Center of St. Paul I: History". Cathedrals of California. Eric Stoltz. Retrieved 10 November 2011.
2. Wong, Dorothy Fue; Nicolais, Robert; Tomlan, Michael (May 19, 2000). "National Historic Landmark Nomination: Baldwin Hills Village" (PDF). National Park Service. Retrieved 10 November 2011.
3. http://www.forbes.com/sites/erincarlyle/2014/09/05/montecito-ranch-on-238-acres-lists-for-125-million/
4. http://sbmag.com/2010/08/the-house-on-the-hill/
5. Redmon, Michael (November 9, 2009). "What is the history of the estate that houses the Music Academy of the West?". Santa Barbara Independent. Retrieved 10 November 2011.
6. "Campus History". Music Academy of the West. Retrieved 10 November 2011.
7. "History". Flintridge Riding Club. Retrieved 10 November 2011.
8. Mr. Cate's School: A Seventy-Five Year History, 1910-1985. (1984). Carpinteria, CA: Cate School Historical Society.