Long before I was the \u201cArchitourist,\u201d I was a fan of Mid-Century Modern architecture. Shelving books at Eglinton Square Library, I remember being over the moon when I discovered Fifties Style: Then and Now by Richard Horn (Penguin, 1985) and, a year later, Populuxe by Thomas Hine (Knopf, 1986). Not only did these books give me the backstory, they gave me the language (Googie, biomorphic, amoeboid, woggle-and-cheese-hole, et cetera) to describe that brief period between, say, 1957 and 1969 (a.k.a. Sputnik to the moon landing) when expressive, futuristic architecture and design reigned supreme.<\/p>\n
In 1995, I purchased Twelve Modern Houses 1945-1985 by Graham Livesey, Michael McMordie and Geoffrey Simmins (Aris Press and University of Calgary Press, 1995) and was gobsmacked by the image on the cover and the content on pages 24 to 27: Jerome Markson\u2019s 1959 James Moses Residence in Hamilton. While I would find additional examples 10 years later as the Architourist, here was my first bit of evidence that Canadians had produced exactly the kind of Jetsons-esque, wildly expressive houses I had thought were exclusive to California.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat house, it sang to me,\u201d says Ken Rosenblood, who moved in with his family in 1970 after the Moses family left the country. \u201cWe already knew it was a really cool place \u2026 and we already knew all the kids on the street.\u201d<\/p>\n
Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n The 360-degree fireplace hangs from the ceiling and is cradled by a circular conversation pit.Dave LeBlanc\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n The street, Mayfair Place, is a little cul-de-sac a stone\u2019s throw away from McMaster University, and Mr. Rosenblood\u2019s father, Hamilton-born Norman Rosenblood (1934-2025), had started teaching English and applied psychoanalysis there a few years before. Plus, Ken Rosenblood\u2019s paternal grandparents, Murray and Sylvia, already lived at No. 10: \u201cHe was the first Jew to come out of the ghetto and buy a house in Westdale in contravention to the CC&Rs [Covenants, Conditions & Restrictions],\u201d says Mr. Rosenblood. \u201cHe did that on Bond Street, and all the Jews moved to Bond Street, including Eugene Levy\u2019s parents. \u2026 My grandfather was an earner, to say the least, so he bought properties on Mayfair.\u201d<\/p>\n Fast-forward to 1984: Ken Rosenblood leaves Hamilton and moves to Los Angeles (his mother, Laurie, an opera singer, was from California).<\/p>\n Fast-forward to 2003: the Architourist meets Jerome Markson (1929-2023), for the first time and I beg him to tell me more about his early, explosively creative work, such as Hamilton\u2019s 45 Amelia St. and eight Mayfair Pl. (while Mr. Markson preferred to talk about social housing, he did later on). And while a visit to the Mayfair house (designed for his cousin and her family) eludes me, I develop a treasured friendship with Jerry and Mayta Markson.<\/p>\n Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n The soaring, double-height, barrel-vaulted living room.Dave LeBlanc\/The Globe and Mail<\/p>\n Which brings us to Saturday, July 4, 2026: armed with the lockbox code, I pull up to Mr. Markson\u2019s magnum opus. Because of my conversation with Mr. Rosenblood and the photographs and drone videos he has sent, I\u2019m prepared for the state of disrepair, which, he assures me, was not intentional: \u201cIt\u2019s like a boiled frog, right. Deferred maintenance. And then the next thing you know [the house is] going down the ravine.\u201d<\/p>\n The house, as I find it, has not begun its unceremonious slide into a verdant grave just yet, but there are cracks in Mr. Markson\u2019s speckled, white-brick box that suggest soft earth and gravity are conspiring to deliver it there within the next few years.<\/p>\n That doesn\u2019t stop my jaw from dropping as I turn the key and enter into the odd, small, circular vestibule \u2013 a moment to decompress from the world \u2013 and spy the soaring, double-height, barrel-vaulted living room. As I walk in and light and air envelope me, I feel that rush that I always do when experiencing the best of mid-century modern architecture: a mix of awe, childlike wonder, beauty, mortality and grace. Next, I almost run to see what the August, 1961 issue of Canadian Homes called \u201ca giant ice cream cone\u201d: the 360-degree fireplace, which hangs from the ceiling and is cradled by a circular conversation pit the magazine compares to a \u201cRoman atrium.\u201d<\/p>\n