The Architecture of Seduction: how Horace Gifford built a modernist, queer paradise
Fire Island is explored through a new edition of Christopher Rawlins’ seminal architectural and social history book on the life and work of Horace Gifford

Fire Island has been a focal point for New York’s gay community since the Jazz Age, with the small towns of Cherry Grove and Fire Island Pines evolving into coastal retreats from oppressive city life, a place where conventions and closets could be discarded along the sandy shores of the Atlantic coast.
Tom Bianchi, Untitled, SX-70 Polaroid, 1970s
Fire Island and Horace Gifford
The architect who gave aesthetic form to this hedonistic environment is now relatively well known, thanks in part to Christopher Rawlins’ 2013 book, Fire Island Modernist: Horace Gifford and the Architecture of Seduction. With the first edition long out of print and highly sought after, a new updated edition has now arrived, fleshing out the story of Gifford’s social and architectural history.
Horace Gifford, Wittstein-Miller House, 1962
A spread from 'Fire Island Modernist'
Horace Gifford was born in Florida in 1932. Despite his lack of formal architectural training, he had an innate understanding of form and material, often working with tiny budgets and small sites to create dramatic, light-filled, modestly-scaled open-planned houses that made the most of Fire Island’s climate and culture. Timber-framed, with large expanses of glass, his houses were both formally inventive and prototypical of a low-impact, sustainable design that’s still so relevant today.
Rubrum House, Horace Gifford, from 'Fire Island Modernist'
A spread from 'Fire Island Modernist'
In total, Gifford built 63 houses on the island, creating a framework and backdrop for a lifestyle that flourished in its seclusion and distance from ‘conventional’ society. Gifford himself found it hard to find work elsewhere once his own orientation was revealed, but even after his death, his legacy still resonates. Although by no means the only architect working on Fire Island - the likes of Andrew Geller were also prolific at this point - Gifford was perhaps the most influential, shaping an aesthetic that continues to be influential today.
Lipkins House, Horace Gifford, from 'Fire Island Modernist'
A spread from 'Fire Island Modernist'
The new edition includes an afterword by architect Charles Renfro of Diller, Scofidio and Renfro as well as five new featured houses and more photography, much of it richly evocative of a more carefree, hedonistic world in the pre-AIDS era. Gifford himself died of AIDS-related complications in 1992, but many of his houses survive and are celebrated in this essential overview of one of modernism’s most intriguing microcosms.
Sloan House, Horace Gifford, from 'Fire Island Modernist'
'Men of the Pines, 1968'
Fire Island Modernist: Horace Gifford and the Architecture of Seduction, Expanded Edition, Christopher Rawlins, $65, Metropolis Books in conjunction with Gordon De Vries Studio, Artbook.com
Receive our daily digest of inspiration, escapism and design stories from around the world direct to your inbox.
Jonathan Bell has written for Wallpaper* magazine since 1999, covering everything from architecture and transport design to books, tech and graphic design. He is now the magazine’s Transport and Technology Editor. Jonathan has written and edited 15 books, including Concept Car Design, 21st Century House, and The New Modern House. He is also the host of Wallpaper’s first podcast.
-
‘Never copy the past’: how Nicolas Di Felice is taking Courrèges into the future
At Courrèges, artistic director Nicolas Di Felice is marrying radical thinking, raving and reinterpreted minimalist codes to give the French fashion house a new dynamism. Hannah Tindle heads to Paris to meet the designer
-
Out of office: the Wallpaper* editors’ picks of the week
Another week, another flurry of events, opening and excursions showcasing the best of culture and entertainment at home and abroad. Catch our editors at Scandi festivals, iconic jazz clubs, and running the length of Manhattan…
-
The Stuff That Surrounds, episode three: Inside the home of architect Glenn Sestig
In The Stuff That Surrounds, Wallpaper* explores a life through objects. This episode, we’re invited inside an architectural gem – just what you'd expect from one of the most distinctive voices in the field today
-
Inside a Donald Wexler house so magical, its owner bought it twice
So transfixed was Daniel Patrick Giles, founder of fragrance brand Perfumehead, he's even created a special scent devoted to it
-
The Pagani Residences is the latest ultra-luxe automotive apartment tower to reach Miami
Rising up above Miami, branded apartment buildings are having a renaissance, as everyone from hypercar builders to crystal makers seeks to have a towering structure bearing their name
-
A modern cabin in Minnesota serves as a contemporary creative retreat from the city
Snow Kreilich Architects' modern cabin and studio for an artist on a lakeside plot in Minnesota was designed to spark creativity and provide a refuge from the rat race
-
Touring artist Glenn Ligon's studio in Brooklyn with its architect, Ravi Raj
Glenn Ligon's studio, designed by architect Ravi Raj, is an industrial Brooklyn space reimagined for contemporary art
-
A dynamic Mar Vista house plays with the rhythm of indoor and outdoor living
A new Mar Vista house, designed by Mexican architecture studio PPAA, combines a façade with a whisper of brutalism, and a breezy, open interior, seamlessly connected to its Los Angeles setting
-
This Michigan lakeside house is an exercise is sculptural minimalism
Explore a Michigan lakeside house, designed by Disbrow Iannuzzi and featuring sculptural timber interiors and a contemporary minimalist feel
-
Welcome to How House, a revived Rudolph Schindler gem in Los Angeles
The latest owner of How House, an early Rudolph Schindler gem, is taking a contemporary approach to conserving its heritage
-
Nearly a century after it was completed, Bruce Goff’s revolutionary Adah Robinson House astonishes once again
The flamboyant building in Tulsa, Oklahoma is beginning its latest chapter as a charitable event space, known as The Oath Studio. See the restoration