Lifchez Gift Website

Collection Description:
In November 2000 Professor Raymond Lifchez, of UC Berkeley's Department of Architecture, made a gift of his personal slide collection, together with appropriate funding for its processing, to the Environmental Design Image Library (formerly the Architecture Slide Library). The Lifchez collection comprises approximately 14,000 slides, the majority photographed by Professor Lifchez during more than twenty years of extensive world travels with his wife Judith Stronach.

Collection Highlights:
The collection includes in-depth studies of the work of Le Corbusier, Louis Kahn, and Herman Hertzberger, extensive coverage of work by 20th Century architects, slides of Turkey and Istanbul used for research and illustration of the book The Dervish Lodge: Architecture, Art and Sufism in Ottoman Turkey, and a large collection of culturally and historically relevant structures from around the world, including images from Europe, Asia especially China the Americas, the Caribbean and Pacific Islands.

In addition to the images chronicling his travels, Professor Lifchez also donated slides from his architecture studio courses, especially those that address social factors in architecture and the design of buildings for people with special needs. Professor Lifchez’s invited physically disabled people into the classroom to discuss the practicalities of his students’ designs. This method was the subject of the documentary film "A House for Someone Unlike Myself" and led to the publication of the book “Rethinking Architecture.”  In recognition of his classroom achievements, Professor Lifchez was honored with the University of California’s 1977 Distinguished Teaching Award. 

To ensure the best possible use of the Lifchez collection, the slides are reviewed for film quality, completeness of documentation, ability to augment the existing Visual Resources Library collection, and pedagogical appropriateness for the College of Environmental Design. Slides meeting those criteria are selected for accessioning and collection development. The slides are given unique image identification numbers, and are scanned, mounted, cataloged and indexed. 

Cataloging and subject indexing of the Lifchez Collection is funded by the Ray Lifchez gift, and is performed by Tansy Matthews, a trained library staff hired specifically for this project. The accessioning/cataloging process is expected to take approximately two years. Upon completion of the project, slides not selected for accessioning will be donated by the Visual Resources Library to an appropriate visual resources collection with a focus on architecture.

• Chinese Architecture
• European Historic Architecture
• Central and South American Architecture
• Le Corbusier
• Louis Kahn
• Herman Hertzberger

Collection Use Guidelines:

The Ray Lifchez Slide Collection is interfiled with the Image Library's circulating collection. You may search the Lifchez Collection online via SPIRO by searching for "Lifchez gift" in the Source box.. Orientations on the use of the Image Library circulating collection are required before initial use of the collection. Borrowing periods and terms of use will vary depending upon your status and affiliation with UC Berkeley. UC Berkeley faculty and students have different use privileges than non-UC Berkeley borrowers.

The college is known for teaching planning and design as disciplines that foster critical thinking, research inquiry, and imaginative problem-solving. Planning and design are pursued not only as ways of developing alternative design solutions to critical environmental challenges facing society but also as ways of exploring the potential of a specific design approach. Each department continually questions the underlying cultural, scientific, and aesthetic assumptions of its discipline and the role they play in how our society formulates solutions to the built environment.