Four local houses will be featured in the next Preserve Arkansas Mid-Century Modern Architecture virtual tour, with two videos scheduled to premiere next week on Preserve Arkansas's Facebook page and YouTube channel.
Both videos will begin at 6 p.m.
The first video will shine the spotlight on the Henley and Riley houses, which are adjacent to each other in the 2500 block of Calion Road.
The houses were designed in 1960 by late architect E. Fay Jones.
Jones spent most of his childhood in El Dorado and was inspired by famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright, with whom Jones apprenticed.
On Thursday, viewers will be able to tour the Gilliam-Wilson and Dr. Carey Clark houses, which were designed by architect Charles Ripley, a contemporary of Jones who graduated from the University of Arkansas's architecture program in 1951.
Jones also attended the University of Arkansas, where he studied engineering and architecture, earning a degree in architecture the year prior to Ripley. The U of A School of Architecture and Design is named for Jones. He taught in the school for 35 years.
Jones died in 2004 at his home in Fayetteville. He was 83.
One of Jones's most well-known designs is the Thorncrown Chapel in Eureka Springs.
The Gilliam-Wilson house, located in the 100 block of Fairway Drive in Country Club Colony, was designed in 1957, and the Clark house, located in the area of East 19th and Forest Lawn, in 1960.
The Preserve Arkansas series highlights the mid-modern century style of architecture, which is characterized by flat planes (roofs), clean lines, large glass windows and open spaces.
Mid-modern houses were primarily built between 1945 and the 1980s, said Elizabeth Eggleston, executive director of the El Dorado Historic District Commission.
The EHDC works hand in hand with and is a member of Preserve Arkansas and other state and national historic preservation agencies to connect local communities to their heritage and provide resources to help local residents to protect and rehabilitate historic places.
"It's nice to see mid-century modern architecture being appreciated now, as we are entering a period where houses from the 1960s are becoming eligible to be on the National Register of Historic Places," Eggleston said.
Properties must be at least 50 years old to be considered for nomination and placement on the NRHP.
"For years they were not eligible to be included on the National Register but now they are," she said.
The Henley and Riley houses, both designed by Jones, are listed on the NRHP as a small historic district -- an effort that was guided by the EHDC in 2017.
Eggleston explained that the mid-modern architectural style grew from a generation of architects who fled the rise of the Nazi Party in Germany between the 1920s and 40s.
Some of the prominent architects of the mid-modern movement include Walter Gropious, Marcel Breuer and Ludwig van der Rohe, who trained Wright.
Eggleston said mid-century modern architecture in the U.S. was the focus of a recent, virtual training session she attended for the National Alliance of Preservation Commissions, of which the EHDC is a member.
Another training Eggleston and EHDC member Linda Rathbun attended two years ago in Iowa also concentrated on the mid-century architectural style.
The pair got an up-close look at Wright's work during one of the tours they took in Iowa, Eggleston said.
"We visited a Frank Lloyd Wright hotel in Mason City, Iowa, and two houses. The people who own the homes took us through there. There were 40 or 50 people on the tour," she shared.
The EHDC is conducting a Cultural Resources/Determination of Eligibility (DOE) survey and inventory for 326 properties in the Mellor, McKinney, Bodenhamer, Forest Lawn and Eastridge subdivisions.
The survey will, in part, determine if the properties are eligible for a listing on the National Register.
The Clark house is one of the properties that is included in the survey.
The next such survey will focus on Country Club Colony, where the Gilliam-Wilson house is located.
