Los Angeles is home to Frank Gehry’s glorious Walt Disney Concert Hall, the space-age wonders of the LAX Theme Building, and the vinyl-needle-stacked Capitol Records Building. there is. But for some design experts, the heart and soul of LA’s architecture lies not just in museums and office towers, but also in noble, often otherworldly homes.
These homes, especially those designed by mid-century greats such as John Lautner, Richard Neutra, Ray Kappe, and Charles and Ray Eames, became an obsession for those tracking the threat posed by fire storms ravaging forested canyons and grassy hillsides. It was. A beautiful setting for this residence.
The landmark beloved by Frank Lloyd Wright, Rudolph Schindler and others escaped the immediate threat of fire, but other famous homes were not as lucky. A partial description of the identified losses follows:
Jane Gray Estate, Altadena: The house, with Spanish, Mission, and Mediterranean Revival design elements on 1.2 acres west of Lake Avenue, was built in 1907 by architects Myron Hunt and Elmer Gray for Chicago business machine manufacturer Arthur Herbert Woodward. Because it was built with reinforced concrete at the time of construction, it was called Altadena’s first fireproof structure. (Woodward’s wife survived the 1903 Iroquois Theater fire in Chicago, which exploded during a performance and killed more than 600 people.) Writer Zane Gray bought the house in 1920, and he and his wife bought it for $3,500. We built an additional building measuring 200 sq. m. Includes the library and office where Gray wrote. The 7,240-square-foot home went on the market in 2020 for about $4 million and is listed as having eight bedrooms, four bathrooms, a commercial kitchen with 15-foot ceilings, a main kitchen, a wine cellar and a walk-in kitchen. . basement. The original cast iron sconces, iron railings, and chandeliers remain in the home, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
Andrew McNally House: Architect Frederick L. Roehrig built this Queen Anne-style mansion in 1887 for Rand McNally Publishing co-founder and president Andrew McNally. McNally paid Roehrig $15,000 to design a mansion at East Mariposa Street and Santa Rosa Avenue in the soon-to-be-built neighborhood. It’s called Millionaire’s Row. The home had a three-story rotunda overlooking the San Gabriel Mountains, and McNally stored his personal railroad car there. He had a gardener who grew Deodar cedar trees along a part of Santa Rosa that became known as Christmas Tree Lane.
Killer House: In 1990, modernist architect Ray Kappe remodeled the home of jazz singer Anne Keeler and her then-husband Gordon Melcher. The 4,142-square-foot cantilevered post-and-beam structure, perched on a forested hillside with canyon and coastline views, hit the market last April for $12 million. The walls and floors of this four-bedroom, three-bathroom home are made of concrete with blocks of redwood, teak, fir and glass. Kappe founded the Southern California Institute of Architecture in 1972 and died in 2019 at age 92.
Jane’s Village: This cluster of historic English villas was built between 1924 and 1926 by architect Elisha P. Janes (known professionally as E.P. Janes). The Janes built at least 270 English and Spanish villas in the area. These are mostly stucco, one-story homes with six rooms, arranged in one of four floor plans, and priced to be accessible to the middle class.
Gregory Ain’s planned home in the park: Designed by Ain in 1948 with the help of Garrett Eckbo, a leading modernist landscape architect of the time, these 28 Midcentury Modern homes were built as part of a social experiment conceived by the modernist architect focused on cost-effective prefabricated design for workers. . It was created to look like a park with no fence in front and landscaping. The house had a side-facing garage, interior courtyard, and glass walls, making it feel like a small home.
Bridges House: Anyone who has driven Sunset Boulevard toward the coast will remember architect Robert Bridges’ Brutalist Bridges House. After working in home construction, including his own home, Bridges became a professor of real estate finance at the USC Marshall School of Business, where he currently serves as professor emeritus. His striking home sat on a boulevard, cantilevered wood and glass over a concrete floor.
Will Rogers’ house: The actor’s ranch home, part of Will Rogers State Historic Park, was destroyed in the Palisades fire. In the 1920s, Rogers built a 31-room residence with 11 bathrooms, a guesthouse, a golf course, stables and a paddock on approximately 360 acres. After his widow Betty donated it to the state in 1944, the property and grounds became a park and museum. “The Rogers family is devastated by the loss of their California ranch and the devastating loss to their community,” Jennifer Rogers-Echeverry, the actor’s great-granddaughter, said in a statement. “Our hearts go out to all of our neighbors who have lost their homes.”
