EDWARD BOSLEY

The Gamble House was the masterpiece of Greene and Greenes new regional style. Built for a wealthy heir of the soap firm Procter and Gamble, the house represents the full aggrandizement and ennoblement of the California bungalow image, yet the building is still striking for its intimacy, intricacy and scale. The relative solidity of the main gabled portions is heightened by the delicate transparency of the Japanese-inspired sleeping porches with their overlapping struts and dee reveals of shadow. The elegance of the overall proportions is continued into the smallest parts and details from the articulation of sliding joints with pegs and tongues to the visual subtlety of tapering beam ends in the balconies. Stunning photography by Tim Street-Porter reveals this house as a genuine and enduring masterpiece.