We aren't fond of mothballs.
We think places—and especially historic houses—are best kept alive, full of oxygen and ideas. As living places, they have so much to offer communities at every scale, from the local to the international.
COVID (and SNOVID!) challenged the Charles Moore Foundation in unprecedented ways. But the pandemic and its lock-downs actually gave us incredibly valuable time, time we used to wholly renew our focus and even expand.
In fact, the Charles Moore Foundation came through these extraordinary times stronger than ever before.
Stay tuned as we finally start public activities again.
Residencies
The Charles Moore Foundation has welcomed residents from all over the world, working in their respective fields of architecture, landscape, art, design, history, theory.
In Austin, the Andersson House, Cube Loft, West Studio, and Box Trot has hosted scores of residents and scholars since the foundation's establishment nearly 30 years ago.
This year, we are expanding our residency program to Los Angeles at the Burns House. That remarkable place, where music and architecture come together, will host resident musicians, composers, musicologists, historians and architects.

Sofia von Erlichshausen and Mauricio Pezo in the Moore/Andersson Compound's Cube Loft. Husband and wife, Sofia and "Pezo" practice and teach architecture in Concepcion, Chile.
Recent & Current Residents
Burns House
Paul Goldberger
Paul Goldberger, a Pultizer Prize winning journalist and architecture critic, was a student of Charles Moore's at Yale University. In addition to his many books, Paul was the chief critic of The New York Times and a writer for The New Yorker.
Read Paul Goldberger's 1974 New York Times Magazine feature about the Burns House.

Charles Moore (left) and Paul Goldberger (right) at the opening celebration for Charles Moore.
Burns House
David Heymann & Sandra Fiedorek
David Heymann, an architect and writer, and Sandra Fiedorek, an artist, are in residence at the Burns House for a month (November-December), as part of a sabbatical from teaching at the University of Texas School of Architecture.
David Heymann offered these observations: "The Burns House (1975) was the first house commission Charles Moore took on in Los Angeles. He was still Dean at Yale, and this house job resulted in his own relocation to his beloved Los Angeles and program leadership at UCLA. Staying in it, one is reminded that two long generations ago, in the endless slow economy of the 1970s and 80s – before money became cheap and concentrated wealth spread – the hidden driver of architectural design was the necessity of stretching a budget. Most architects then could estimate building costs quickly and accurately, and so doing for the best of them was the portal into conceptual invention (immaterial surface tactics can be understood in this light as the surest way to get the most from the least).
The Burns house accomplishes more per square foot than most spaces I’ve ever seen. The building might best be described as a very complicated first-year student’s enthusiasm in color and foam core, were that student an uninhibited genius with a lifetime of experience. Working with a small footprint, small lot, and relatively small budget, Moore’s plan and section are an absurd, multi-layered, multi-colored, multi-leveled spun-sugar confection, cobbled over the frame of a manic pyramidal double stair that somehow gives each of the house’s sybaritic sub-realms direct outdoor access to the pool, while still allowing for an actual, soaring pipe organ hall.
It’s tempting to think that in Los Angeles, Moore found himself in a culture that helped focus even more what was, layered over his knowledge of how to build, already present in his thinking: the tactics and perverse economy of stage and set, of lighting and suggestion, of action and plot, of motive and desire. All of these are fully in play at the Burns House, and—like in one of Hitchcock’s California films—are sharpened by the contradiction of the clear, bright ocean air that envelopes the absurd false innocence of its Santa Monica Canyon site."


Oral History Project
Burns House
Tim Vreeland
Kevin Keim recently welcomed to the Burns House the architect Tim Vreeland.
Vreeland, who will celebrate his 98th birthday on January 1, worked closely with Louis Kahn and was friends and academic colleagues with Charles Moore.
Kevin interviewed and filmed Timothy Vreeland about his work and memories of Louis Kahn and Charles Moore.

Exhibition
Dublin, Ireland
The Charles Moore Foundation loaned a sketchbook that is the basis of the exhibition "Sweet Disorder and the Carefully Careless Ideas, Faces and Places: Robert Maxwell and Celia Scott" at the Irish Architectural Archive in Dublin.
The sketchbook contains a series of drawings by the late Robert Maxwell, the esteemed architect, educator, and writer. Colin Rowe, whose library resides at the Charles Moore Foundation, received the sketchbook as a gift from Maxwell.




Lee Burns Memorial Concert
Burns House
Craig Phillips
The organist Craig Phillips performed works by Dieterich Buxtehude, Johann Sebastian Bach, Pierre Du Magre, Johannes Brahms, and Felix Mendelssohn for a Memorial Concert in honor of Lee Burns and the future life of the Burns House.

Describe your image

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New Book...
A Place of Celebration
O'Neil Ford's Modern Hacienda in San Antonio
Foundation Director Kevin Keim spent a year photographing the landmark Steves House in the San Antonio neighborhood Terrell Hills.
O'Neil Ford and Chalres Moore first corresponded in 1955, and Moore was the first professor to occupy the O'Neil Ford Centennial Chair at the University of Texas School of Architecture.
The architectural historian Mary Carolyn George wrote the book, which Kevin Keim designed.




Guest Artist
Burns House
Gabriel Mulder
Gabriel is a pianist and student of composition who visits to work with the Steinway & Sons Model B.

Former Residents
Teo Altomirano (Lima)
Stan Anderson (Cambridge)
John Andrews (London, United Kingdom)
Bill Arnig (Houston)
Charles Atlas (New York)
Jose Bernardi (Phoenix)
Marlon Blackwell (Fayetteville)
Peter Bonfig (Munich, Germany)
Kathy Box (Dallas)
Rick Brettel (Dallas)
Ethel Buisson (Paris, France)
Jennider Burris (Montreal)
Rachel Busch (Jackson)
Peter Cardew (Vancouver, Canada)
Chris Carson (San Antonio)
Carol Chen (Petaluma)
Nancy Chen (Toronto, Canada
Jeffrey Chusid (Ithaca)
Coleman Coker (New Orleans)
John Corvino (Detroit)
Jackson Crane (Boulder)
Sarah Cunningham Los Angeles)
Uli Dangel (Munchen, Germany)
Erik DeLuca (New York)
Derek Dellekamp (Mexico City, Mexico)
Deborah Douglas (Chicago)
Bill Dupont (San Antonio)
Merrill Elam (Atlanta)
Dan Etheridge (Melbourne, Australia)
Sofia von Ellrichshausen (Concepcion, Chile)
Beth Goff-McMillan (Dallas)
Michael Graves (Princeton)
Nicholas Frankel (Charlottesville)
Braden Engel (San Francisco)
Herb Enns (Winnipeg, Canada)
Bruce Ferguson (New York)
Luke Fishbeck (New York)
Adam Ganz (London, England)
Adam Word Gates (San Antonio)
Max Goelitz (Munich, Germany)
Paul Goldberger, New York
Michelle Grabbner (New York)
Mary Griffin (San Francisco)
Pankaj Gupta & Christine Mueller (Delhi, India)
Danelle Guthrie & Tom Buresh (Berkeley)
Annie Han & Daniel Mihalyo (Seattle)
Kevin & Elaine Harrington (Chicago)
Richard Hayes (Cambridge, United Kingdom)
Lindsay Hearn (Asheville)
Sand Helsel (Melbourne. Australia)
David Heymann & Sandy Fidorek (Austin)
Ben Holland (Boulder)
Malcolm Holzman (New York)
Jade Hurst (Auckland, New Zealand)
Per Henrik Jirstand (Copenhagen, Denmark)
Jennifer Jones (San Francisco)
Diana Keller (Austin)
Kyle Kimler (San Diego)
Matt King (Los Angeles)
Kimberly Kohlhaas (Austin)
Kyriakos Kyriakou (Athens, Greece)
Glenn Murcutt (Sydney, Australia)
Vance Muse (Houston)
Dan Naegele (Ames)
Grayson Norwood (Austin)
Laurie Olin (Philadelphia)
Robin Osler (New York)
Maria Perbellini & Christian Pomgratz (Verona, Italy)
Richard Peters (Sonoma)
Steve Peterschmidt (Colorado Springs)
Maurizio Pezo (Concepcion, Chile)
Courtney Pittmann (Petaluma)
Theresa Puente (Chicago)
Cecilia Puga (Santiago, Chile)
Philippa Read (Leeds, England)
Noah Riley (Los Angeles)
Katherine Rinne (Berkeley)
Elizabeth Barlow Rogers (New York)
Greg Rucks (Boulder)
Lori Ryker (Jackson)
John Paul Rysavvy (New York)
Paul Shepherd (London, United Kingdom)
Lori Smithey (Houston)
Jill Snyder (Cleveland)
Stefanie Sobelle (New York)
Colin Rowe (Washington, DC)
Bahram Safinia (New York)
Simone Salfner (New York)
Pablo Sanchez (New York)
Margo Sawyer (Austin)
Jason Scroggin (Lexington)
Igor Sidiqqui (San Francisco)
Mikael Silvanto (Cupertino)
Nancy Faye Smith (Houston)
Peter Smithson (London, United Kingdom)
Lawrence Speck (Austin)
Michael Stanton (New Orleans)
AJ Strasser (New York)
Pamela Sztybel (New York)
Jose Maria Saez Vaquero (Quito, Ecuador)
Francisco Staton (Mexico City, Mexico)
Fritz Steiner (Austin)
Rebecca Taylor (Montreal, Canada)
Jacob Termansen (Copenhagen, Denmark)
Eliza Thomas (Austin)
Magdalena Villareal (Guadalajara, Mexico)
Sarah Waller (New York)
Jun Watanabe (Tokyo, Japan)
Jerry Weiland (Boulder)
Allyn West (Houston)
Stacy Williams (San Francisco)
Kramer Woodard (Albuquerque)
Lebbeus Woods (New York)
Richard Wright (Edinburgh, United Kingdom)
Jim Yarbrough (Austin)