Few architects did more than Craig Ellwood to create the image or life-style of post-war Los Angeles.  Perched on the steep sides of canyons, his houses were sleek, minimalist affairs of steel and glass while his public buildings were expressive essays in structural engineering.  Although he was feted world-wide in the architectural press, Craig Ellwood’s rise from humble beginnings to architectural stardom was as much the product of single-minded self-promotion as it was of any real design skill or architectural ability.  But then, Craig Ellwood was not an architect and he wasn’t really Craig Ellwood either.

Neil Jackson, the President of the SAHGB, is an architect and architectural historian and the Charles Reilly Professor of Architecture, University of Liverpool.  He has published widely on 19th and 20th-century architecture in Britain, America and Japan.  His 2002 book, Craig Ellwood, won the Banister Fletcher Prize; his most recent book, Japan and the West: An Architectural Dialogue, was published in 2019.