Paul Rudolph’s Sanderling Beach Club Cabanas in Sarasota Destroyed by Hurricane Helene
Archival photo of the Sanderling Beach Club and its cabanas on Siesta Key, Sarasota, Florida. Photo courtesy Paul Rudolph Collection, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
The New York–based Paul Rudolph Institute for Modern Architecture has shared news that the Rudolph–designed cabanas at the Sanderling Beach Club in Sarasota, Florida, have been destroyed by Hurricane Helene. While details are still emerging, the Institute said that it was contacted this morning by local architect Max Strang, who published photos of the ruined beachfront structures on his Instagram Stories. The cabanas, known for their low vaulted ceilings and sheathed plywood construction, were designed by Rudolph in 1952. In 1994, the club, located on Sarasota’s Siesta Key, was added to the National Register of Historic Places. (More information about the site can be found here.)
It is unclear* if any other Rudolph buildings located in and around Sarasota on Florida’s Gulf Coast—and there are many, including his addition at the city’s public high school and numerous private homes, including the Umbrella House, Revere Quality House, and the Healy Guest House, all of which RECORD visited in 2023—were impacted by Helene, which made landfall in Florida as a category 4 storm late yesterday.
Paul Rudolph poses on the lookout platform at the Sanderling Beach Club on Siesta Key in Sarasota. Photo courtesy Paul Rudolph Collection, Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
Rudolph, who moved to Sarasota after studying with Walter Gropius at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, was perhaps the most prominent member of the Sarasota School of Architecture, a post-war regional architectural style also known as Sarasota Modern that flourished on Florida’s central west coast from the early 1940s through the mid-60s. Other architects associated with the movement include Ralph Twitchell, Victor Lundy, Tim Seibert, and Carl Abbott.
Coincidentally, a new exhibition titled Materialized Space: The Architecture of Paul Rudolph opens September 30 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
RECORD has reached out to Architecture Sarasota, a non-profit education and advocacy organization that celebrates and promotes the city’s rich design heritage through various programming initiatives including exhibitions, tours, and a signature awards program, to comment on the destruction of the Sanderling Beach Club cabanas and to confirm if any other significant Modernist buildings in the area suffered damage. We will continue to update this article as more information becomes available.
*Update: Morris “Marty” Hylton III, president of Architecture Sarasota, has confirmed with RECORD that at least two other Rudolph properties, the Revere Quality House and the Healy Guest House, also known as the Cocoon House, experienced flooding due to storm surge brought on by Hurricane Helene. He relays that the organization will assess the damages and consider next steps.
Update 2: Architecture Sarasota has issued an official statement confirming the loss of the Sanderling Beach cabanas and damage to “many of our Sarasota School and other local landmarks.”
“As assessments of the damage caused by Hurricane Helene continue, I am saddened that has meant so much to be for decades, and that I now call home, has been so significantly impacted,” writes Hylton, pledging to support local recovery efforts and keep the public informed with continual updates. “This moment only strengthens my resolve for Architecture Sarasota to serve as a resource and partner in addressing the challenges our community faces.”
Austin LeFebvre for Architecture Sarasota
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