“Architecture is the masterly, correct and magnificent play of masses brought together in light,” Le Corbusier once said. Then again, sometimes it’s making a building that looks like a doughnut. “California Crazy,” to be released next month by Taschen ($60), looks at offbeat structures around Los Angeles from the past century. The city’s Hollywood connection and car culture helped give rise to fanciful designs that aimed to catch the attention of passing drivers. The mild climate was a factor, too, allowing buildings to go up quickly and cheaply. The idea later spread, with California offering “a template that emboldened people in other states and countries to thumb their noses at the status quo and build the impossible—or at least the highly improbable,” author Jim Heimann writes.