Structures of Utility [Hardcover]

David Stark Wilson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 2003

Vernacular architecture amidst the California landscape is captured eloquently by David Stark Wilson’s appreciative and knowledgeable eye. Using a large format view camera, Wilson has elevated vernacular structures of pure utility and highlighted their consequence, meaning, and haunting beauty. Grain elevators, gold rush buildings, tank houses, greenhouses, covered bridges, barns, silos, stamp mills, Quonset huts, water flumes and other rural structures are presented in this daringly designed book.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

David Stark Wilson, born in Berkeley, California, has been a building designer for over fifteen years. His projects have won awards from the Berkeley Architectural Heritage Association, "Sunset", and "Metropolitan Home Magazine." An avid mountaineer and skier, he developed a love of photography at an early age. His interests in design and photography converged during his back-road encounters with the austere agricultural buildings of California’s Central Valley. He has photographed architecture for "Sunset," "Better Homes and Gardens", and "San Francisco Magazine." David lives in Berkeley with his wife, Stacia Cronin, and children, Chase and Kai.

See more of David Stark Wilson's work at the Bateman Gallery.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 144 pages
• Publisher: Heyday Books (May 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1890771627
• ISBN-13: 978-1890771621
• Product Dimensions: 11.3 x 11.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,557,489 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A landscape of emphatic structures, September 28, 2008

By 

Robin Benson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Structures of Utility (Hardcover)

Who would have thought that abandoned grain elevators, old elevated wooden tank houses (to hold water and supply pressure to agricultural areas) and hydraulic mines from California's gold rush would produce such remarkable photos. In the hands of photographer David Wilson these ancient commercial structures take on a life of their own. Sited in the mostly flat Central Valley and slowly disappearing this visual record fortunately captures many buildings for the record.

Just to have Wilson's photo book of these structures would be enough to make a purchase but I think the book goes a lot further. I think it is a very successful attempt to produce a package that works from the cover onwards. Book designer Todd Foreman has used the photos to create a sense of pace and interest as you turn over the pages, sometimes it is the use of a fifth color panel between photos on a spread or repeating one image several times on a page, butting some photos together, running some of the photos off the page edge or enlarging a section of an image.

Don't think though that this sounds like an over designed photo book because it isn't. The book's basic format is of oblong images (printed in 200 dpi) untouched on the page with the more graphic treatments blending in perfectly. Include the jacket, cover, fly-leaf, title, imprint, the five caption pages at the back, paper, layout and typography have all been considered.

Structures of Utility is one of those rare books that goes the extra mile for the reader.

***SEE SOME INSIDE PAGES by clicking 'customer images' under the cover.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The antidote for soulless design, May 13, 2004

By 

Tarek Milleron (Berkeley, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Structures of Utility (Hardcover)

Among countless books of beautiful photographs, I've found few that change the way I look at the world. What Ansel Adams did for the sights of Half Dome and El Capitan in Yosemite, David Stark Wilson has done for the lowly silo, the aging mine complex, the agricultural shed. After looking over his photos of those structures-the `structures of utility' of his title-I will never take a drive in rural America with the same old eye again. Wilson has ground a new lens for all of us that could and should impact the design of what he terms the "built environment", the spread of buildings that has become a texture on the landscape in so many areas outside of cities. Wilson makes a strong case for examining structures largely overlooked until now to rescue us from the endless expansion of tilt-up warehouses or soulless stucco cartoons. We have an incredibly rich tradition of utilitarian design, Wilson shows us, that should be drawn upon to help make the structures we build worthy of the landscapes they occupy. Every county planner, every mall designer, every architect, every student of design should own a copy of his important book.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Rich Way of Seeing, June 23, 2004

By 

Gerald Haslam (Penngrove, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Structures of Utility (Hardcover)

This unusual book may actually leave readers and viewers with not only enriched visual abilities but also a broader concept of buildings and of the nature of beauty. Wilson does this by showing us pleasing patterns to be found in everyday structures. He recognizes the utility and the aesthic qualities of sheds and barns and tanks, offering photographs and texts to illustrate and explain why we, like him, find his examples so pleasing: The texture of a wall that catches light just so...the slope of a roof that blends with the landscape...the sensuous angle of a doorway.
The text is crisply written and mostly jargon free--yet not oversimplified--a fitting complement to the original vision that led to these illustrations. This is a surprising and surprisingly satisying book. Hats off to Mr. Wilson.