Born of prosperity, sunlight and optimism, California’s dream homes now lie in ashes | Rowan Moore

Magnificent, irreplaceable 20th-century architecture made with craft and imagination was destroyed in the Palisades wildfires

Pacific Palisades and its surrounding neighbourhoods, which have burned so ferociously over the past three weeks, happen to be the location of some beautiful and magnificent 20th-century architecture. Or were, as the fire has taken a terrible toll.

Houses by the emigre Austrian modernist Richard Neutra have gone, as have most of the Park Planned Homes of 1948, an idealistic experiment in affordable modern living by the architect Gregory Ain. Stone chimney stacks are all that remain of the scaled-up cabin that was Will Rogers' ranch house. His 30-horse stables, in their centre a rotonda like an equine chapter house, are ashes.