A Modern pursuit online

Purists might sneer at this website’s all-American depiction of midcentury modernism. After all, it does cite “The Jetsons,” Las Vegas, Formica and tiki chic as paragons of style.

But Lotta Living’s 37-entry glossary of terms includes a clear and concise description of Bauhaus and the Dutch design group De Stijl, and once and for all settles the debate between what is Modern and what is Moderne. (The former is post-World War II design, the latter prewar Art Deco style.)

Dedicated to the pursuit of 1950s futurist architecture, Space-Age Googie-style coffee shops, exotic lounge music and Polynesian umbrella cocktails, Lotta Living also has a sober side, chronicling the architecture of Orange County and the San Fernando Valley on pages that could do with a little updating.

While it is easy to get sidetracked by links to other groovy sites and shopping pages, don’t miss Lotta Living’s highlight: a well-researched and reverent look at the modern tract homes built by Joseph Eichler in 1963-64 in Balboa Highlands, a subdivision in Granada Hills that often serves as a stand-in for suburban Vegas on the CBS hit “CSI.”

-- David A. Keeps