Edward Killingsworth

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Edward Killingsworth, FAIA, (1917–2004) was an American architect. He is best known as a participant in Arts & Architecture's Case Study program in the mid-1950s. He designed and built Case Study House #25, "The Frank House," in Naples, California. He also designed numerous luxury hotels all over the world and a large part of the California State University, Long Beach campus. In the architecture world, "Killingsworth" is synonymous with ultra-cool Southern California Post-and-Beam Mid-Century Modern.

[edit] Biography

Killingsworth was born in Taft on Nov. 4, 1917. Following the discovery of oil on Signal Hill in 1921, his oilman father moved the family south to Long Beach. During Killingsworth's years at Wilson High School, his original ambition was to become a painter, but he decided to major in something a little more practical at the University of Southern California. At USC, Killingsworth excelled at the next best thing, earning not only his bachelor of architecture degree in 1940, but also the American Institute of Architects Medal for having the highest academic record in his class.

The start of Killingsworth's professional career was delayed by his service in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers during World War II. As an operations officer attached to the 654th Engineer Topographic Battalion, Killingsworth earned a Bronze Star for supervising the production of more than 8 million photo-maps in preparation for the Allied invasion of Europe.

After returning from the war in 1945, Killingsworth went to work as an associate for Long Beach architect Kenneth S. Wing. Killingsworth was discovered in 1950 as John Entenza, creator of the Case Study Program, drove by Killingsworth's in-laws' recently built house in Los Alamitos, California. When Entenza found out Killingsworth was the architect, he invited him to participate in the program. This house was Killingsworth's first solo project and was one of Southern California's first post and beam structures.

He went on to design many highly acclaimed projects in Long Beach. One of them, the Opdahl House, also in Naples and just blocks away from Case Study House #25, stands as a monument to Mid-Century architecture. By the early-1960s, Killingsworth also went on to design civic and commercial buildings including much of the CSULB campus.

As the years passed and the honors piled up, Killingsworth's architectural projects grew in size and scale, from residential buildings in Southern California to luxury hotels in such exotic locales as Hawaii, Guam, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia and Indonesia.

Philosophically, like many of his contemporaries, Killingsworth believed in open spaces and floor plans. He preferred high ceilings and glass walls that invited nature in.