Book Talk – E 1027: Restoring a House By the Sea

Published following the completion the long-awaited restoration of a legendary house, this book explores an exemplary conservation project. A modern house par excellence, Villa E 1027, located in Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, was built between 1926 and 1929 by the artist and interior designer Eileen Gray, for and in collaboration with her friend, architect Jean Badovici. After the death of Badovici in 1956, the house was abandoned and fell into disrepair, but eventually became a historical monument in 2000. The Cap Moderne Association, led by Michael Likierman, and assisted by a scientific committee chaired by Jean-Louis Cohen, took charge of the house's restoration from 2014 to 2021. 

In celebration of the opening of E 1027 to the public, E 1027: Restoring a House By the Sea (Editions du Patrimoine, 2022) recounts its history, placed in the context of modern architecture. Edited by Cohen, the book assembles contributions by authors specialized in modern architecture, Eileen Gray, and Le Corbusier. The book also includes accounts from witnesses and neighbors who were close to Eileen Gray and Jean Badovici. The very people who worked on bringing the villa back to life reveal the secrets of an exemplary restoration. 

A thorough photographic survey by Manuel Bougot allows readers to visit the site step by step, observe its smallest details, and discover each object.
 

Speakers:
Jean-Louis Cohen, Sheldon H. Solow Chair for the History of Architecture, Institute of Fine Arts, New York University
Michael Likierman, President, Cap Moderne Association
Jorge Otero-Pailos, Director and Professor of Historic Preservation, Columbia University GSAPP
Nina Stritzler Levine, Historian and Curator, 2020 Eileen Gray Exhibition, Bard Graduate Center

Moderated by:
Mary McLeod, Professor of Architecture, Columbia University GSAPP; Member, E 1027 Scientific Committee

About the Speakers:
Jean-Louis Cohen trained in Paris as an architect and a historian. He has held the Sheldon H. Solow Chair for the History of Architecture at New York University's Institute of Fine Arts since 1994. He has curated exhibitions shown in many venues on both sides of the Atlantic, including the Centre Pompidou, MoMA, the CCA and MAXXI. He has published more than forty books, including: Building a New New World: Amerikanizm in Russian Architecture (2020), Frank Gehry; Catalogue Raisonné of the Drawings; Volume One, 1954-1978 (2020), Le Corbusier: The Built Work (2018), France, Modern Architectures in History (2015), Le Corbusier: An Atlas of Modern Landscapes (2013), The Future of Architecture Since 1889 (2012), Architecture in Uniform (2011), and Le Corbusier and the Mystique of the USSR (1992). Between 2014 to 2021, he chaired the scientific committee for the restoration of Villa E 1027.

Michael Likierman, an Englishman with Polish origins, has been living and working in France since the United Kingdom joined Europe in 1972. He was educated at Stowe and New College Oxford. He co-founded Habitat in France in the 1970s, and worked briefly the in the USA, advising the retailer Design Research. He then co-founded and chaired the European Optical Retailer Grandvision in Paris for 25 years. Passionately interested in the restoration of historic monuments, he restored Les Colombières (Ferdinand Bac, 1919-24) in Menton for himself before chairing the restoration for the French State of Serre de la Madone (Lawrence Johnston, 1924-28) and E 1027 (Eileen Gray and Jean Badovici, 1926-29). He is currently overseeing the restoration of exceptional gardens in Menton and the French Riviera. A partner in the illustrious Mirazur restaurant in Menton, he has been appointed Chevalier des Arts et Lettres and Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur.

Jorge Otero-Pailos is the Director and Professor of Historic Preservation at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation. Hee is an artist, architect and theorist specializing in experimental forms of preservation. He is the founder and editor of the journal Future Anterior, editor of Historic Preservation Theory: An Anthology, Readings from the 18th to the 21st century (2023), co-editor of Experimental Preservation (2016), and author of Architecture’s Historical Turn (2010), as well as a contributor to many scholarly journals and books. Otero-Pailos's artistic works have been commissioned by and exhibited at major heritage sites, museums, foundations, and biennials, including Artangel’s public art commission at the UK Parliament, the Venice Art Biennial, the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Louis Vuitton Foundation, the Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary, SFMoMA, Frieze London, and the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. He is the recipient of a 2021-22 American Academy in Rome residency in the visual arts.

Nina Stritzler-Levine works in the fields of modern and contemporary architecture and design, and curatorial theory and practice. She focuses on the history of design companies, alternative modernisms, gender, class and sexuality, and the intersections of architecture, design, contemporary art, and social justice. Many of her exhibitions and publications have received critical acclaim and awards including Eileen Gray (2020), Artek and the Aaltos (2016), Sheila Hicks: Weaving as Metaphor (2006), and Josef Frank: An Alternative Vision of the Modern Home (1996). She was also co-director of the groundbreaking project Waterweavers: The River in Colombian Art, Craft and Design (2014). Her exhibition Steven Holl: Making Architecture (2018), organized by the Dorsky Museum, is currently touring in Europe. In 2021, Stritzler-Levine curated the exhibition Focus: Art and Social Justice, at Woodstock Artists Association and Museum. She is the former director of Bard Graduate Center Gallery where she also served as Director of Curatorial Affairs and Head of Gallery Publications.

Mary McLeod is a Professor of Architecture at Columbia University, teaching architectural history and theory. Her research and publications have focused on the history of the modern movement and on contemporary architecture theory, examining issues concerning the connections between architecture and politics. She is the editor of and contributor to the book Charlotte Perriand: An Art of Living (2003), as well as the co-editor of Architecture, Criticism, Ideology (1985), and the website Pioneering Women of American Architecture with Victoria Rosner. Her essays have appeared in numerous journals such as AA Files, Journal of Architecture, Assemblage, JSAH, Casabella, and Oppositions, and in books such as Modern Architecture and the Lifeworld, Architecture School, Modern Women, Feminism and Architecture, Building Systems, Architectural Theory since 1968, and Complexity and Contradiction at Fifty. She served for six years on the scientific committee for the restoration of Villa E 1027.

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