Fellowship Recipient
Luke Leuschner (b. 2002) is a California-based historian focused on the state’s architecture, urbanism, and identity, with a particular interest on the state’s desert regions. Born and raised in Palm Desert, CA, he developed an affinity for the city’s forgotten and undocumented modern architecture. The interest led him to the Historical Society of Palm Desert, where he worked (and continues to work) on a multi-year endeavor to document and archive the city’s built environment. Since then, he has worked and consulted on a number of architectural history and archive projects in the Coachella Valley and beyond. Leuschner’s research seeks not only to focus on architecture, but the way in which the idealized “wasteland” desert is perceived and utilized in the built environment. His current project is a book on the work of the modernist architect Rudolph Schindler in the California desert, and takes a deep dive into the kinds of the people who have historically called its arid regions home. Aside from his research, he sits on the City of Berkeley’s Landmarks Preservation Commission and is a board member of the California Garden and Landscape History Society. Leuschner holds a degree from the University of California, Berkeley entitled “Adaptive Reuse and the American City,” a combination of the city planning and architectural history disciplines.