The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation (PRHF) in New York City has designated North Carolina Modernist Houses’ online archive as the official index for the residential work by the former dean of the Yale School of Architecture who inspired a generation of architects.  

As the official archive, North Carolina Modernist Houses (NCMH) will maintain and update the Paul Rudolph section of its archive as houses are sold, changed, or threatened. NCMH has modified the page to add the PRHF logo, link, and connection. The Heritage Foundation is now directing visitors to the NCMH website exclusively for Rudolph-designed houses.

“This is an innovative and groundbreaking partnership between an architecture foundation and our Masters Gallery archives,” said NCMH Executive Director George Smart. “We are honored to be the official site for Paul Rudolph’s residential work, which will allow the PRHF to devote more of its resources towards protecting and saving Rudolph’s non-residential buildings across America and the world.”

NCMH is an award-winning non-profit organization dedicated to archiving, preserving, and promoting modernist houses and those who design them. Along with North Carolina houses and designers, the NCMH website includes an extensive Masters Gallery, featuring the residential work of national and international Modernist masters, including Paul Rudolph (pictured below). As a result, the NCMH archive is the largest open digital archive of its type in the nation.

Paul Rudolph (1918-1997) is best known in North Carolina for his 1972 design of the former Burroughs Wellcome headquarters in Research Triangle Park. In Florida, however, he was one of the leaders of the Sarasota Style (1941-1966) that gave Florida’s central west coast its vast collection of Modernist houses designed specifically for that region’s climate and terrain. Large sunshades, innovative ventilation systems, oversized sliding glass doors, floating staircases, and walls of jalousie windows dominated many of these houses, including Rudolph’s 1953 “Umbrella House” on Lido Key (pictured above). By the 1970s that house succumbed to decay and storms.

PRHF Director Mark Medoff commented on the decision to make NCMH Rudolph’s official residential archive: “The Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation’s mission is to actively promote the heritage and legacy of Paul Rudolph’s work. Especially as we approach the 100th anniversary of Paul Rudolph’s birth, we are striving to find the best ways to make our Foundation a primary reference on Paul Rudolph-designed iconic buildings. The collaboration with NCMH allows the PRHF and NCMH to share responsibility in maintaining the most up-to-date repository for information on Paul Rudolph’s worldwide projects.”

For more information on the PRHF, go to www.paulrudolphheritagefoundation.org.