"A comprehensive survey of one of Florida's most prolific and influential architects of the mid-twentieth century. In an era when we seek resiliency in design and building, there are lessons to be learned in the work of Alfred Browning Parker, a subtropical master."--Anthony Abbate, AIA, and contributor to Miami Modern Metropolis

Alfred Browning Parker (1916 - 2011) was one of the twentieth century's most renowned and honored Florida-based architects. A principal leader of the "Coconut Grove School" of tropical organic architecture, his influence has been felt throughout the United States and the Caribbean. Attaining an almost rock star-like status in his home city of Miami, Parker was publicly praised by Frank Lloyd Wright.
Parker's work and philosophy has had an ecological and environmental basis since the early 1940s. He began expressing an interest in alternative fossil fuels and renewable energy sources in the 1970s, far ahead of the current trends in green and energy-conscious architecture. He continually placed an emphasis on using local materials and was increasingly praised for his early exploration in environmentally friendly design.
Randolph Henning's overview of the life work of this modernist master features sixty-nine of the more than five hundred residential and commercial structures Parker created between 1942 and 2001. The descriptions are accompanied by nearly 400 color photographs, more than a third of which are vintage images from renowned photographer Ezra Stoller. Henning also provides a biographical narrative, excerpts from Parker’s own writings, a full bibliography, and a complete list of Parker’s works.

Randolph C. Henning is the author of At Taliesin: Newspaper Columns by Frank Lloyd Wright and the Taliesin Fellowship, 1934-1937 and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Taliesin: Illustrated by Vintage Postcards. He is a practicing architect and lives in Lewisville, North Carolina.

No Sample Chapter Available

Awards
Mary Ellen LoPresti Award - 2012

"With this easily accessible, beautifully produced book, Randolph C. Henning has re- inscribed Browning into the register of modern architects alongside fellow mavericks of the San Francisco Bay Area School, the Los Angeles Case Study Houses, and the Sarasota Florida School."
--Florida Historical Quarterly