Angel's-eye View

Edie Cohen -- Interior Design, 10/1/2005 12:00:00 AM

"An exclamation point over Los Angeles." That's how Tim Street-Porter describes the J. Paul Getty Museum. But true to his passion for the unexpected and idiosyncratic, this award-winning architectural photographer chose not to shoot Richard Meier's gleaming white citadel. Instead, Street-Porter focused on Laurie Olin's garden at the southernmost edge of the hilltop site, with Westwood in the distance.

Appearing in his fifth book, Los Angeles, the Getty joins 200 wide-ranging subjects—by day and by night. Near Venice Beach, he captured the cubist architecture of the LA Louver gallery. At José Rafael Moneo's Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, Street-Porter expresses himself through his close-up of the 50-foot-tall concrete crucifix. In the lobby of downtown's hip Standard Hotel, his eye was drawn to the landscape of Vladimir Kagan furniture.

Rizzoli International Publications has printed Los Angeles in a limited edition of 5,000. The book opens with an introduction by Diane Keaton, whose design credentials include a place on the board of directors of the Los Angeles Conservancy. Bonuses include a signed print and eight enormous gatefolds—seeing the Roosevelt Hotel's David Hockney pool at 41/2 feet wide is almost as good as diving in.