To live in Los Angeles It should be regularly reminded that much of what surrounds its residents is temporary. It has to do, fundamentally, with human life and the natural world, as this week’s deadly fires reminded us. But also both the vital everyday structures and cultural monuments that helped mark the place’s great achievements, tell the stories of its citizens and embody its startling confluence of talent, originality and freedom.
Many landmarks from the city’s early history to its experimental, mid-century modern, and contemporary days have fallen victim to the wildfires that have ravaged the region.
News broke Wednesday of the loss of the historic ranch house that once belonged to beloved Hollywood cowboy and comedian Will Rogers, who bought hundreds of acres in the Pacific Palisades foothills in the 1920s.
The land, now a California state park, is a place where you can hike up a trail and find a sparkling, spectacular view of the ocean in about 10 minutes. The Rogers’ rustic 1926 clapboard house, perched on a slight rise with its wide porch and open yard, was like a walk through a rural time warp. A hybrid of authentic country living and Los Angeles style upscale. There was a wagon-wheel chandelier, barn-like rafters, a heavy stone fireplace topped with a prize longhorn head, and endless western paraphernalia, including saddles, Navajo rugs and Sepia family photos.
Rogers hosted Walt Disney here with Clark Gable and Charles Lindbergh. Just as amazing were the wooden stables adjacent to the courtyard. Rogers’ visitors went to saddle their horses on their way to the adjacent riding area and the polo field below.
Victoria Yost, an architect based in Venice, California, called it her “happy place” when we visited about a year ago. “There was something magical about it,” he said Wednesday. “It just felt like old California. You can only imagine this incredible lifestyle. He was particularly taken by the central rotunda of the stables, whose intricate radial rafters quietly took your breath away. It was an architectural gem, hidden in plain sight as hikers made their way into the back canyon.
“This is an absolutely devastating blow to all of us,” said Adrian Scott Fine, chief executive of the Los Angeles Conservancy, the region’s largest conservation advocacy group. “It’s just a touchstone. You can hardly talk about the history of Southern California and the Pacific Palisades without acknowledging this cultural folk hero, Will Rogers.
Fine said he and his colleagues have a thorough record of the destruction of cultural heritage in the region.
“These are deep losses,” he said. “There are no other places like this that can tell these kinds of stories.”
Another major loss in Pacific Palisades is Ray Kappe’s Keeler House from 1991, considered one of the hallmarks of this talented, often overlooked Los Angeles architect. (Kappe, who died in 2019, was a founder of the avant-garde Southern California Institute of Architecture, or SCI-Arc.)
The homeowner, Ann Keller, 68, is safely out of town. He said a neighbor confirmed to him that it had been destroyed. “It’s gone,” he said.
Cantilevered atop a steep hillside site and peering out over the ocean, the residence showcased Capé’s boldness and intuitive talent. He opened his space through a central staircase lit by a tall gabled skylight, linked by oversized windows to the view below. Bounded by floating, staggered floors and large balconies, the ethereal property remains grounded by exposed redwood and smooth, thick concrete heights.
While the home’s dramatic views and monumental forms seduced visitors, Keller, who has lived there since its completion, especially loved details like the silky redwood floors. “We were all hitting wood when it came. It was so beautiful,” he said. He noted that the upper floor’s exposed redwood beams were made of overlapping boards, giving them striking texture and presence. “To be able to sit at the dining room table and look at these amazing joists and their shadows — that’s something I really enjoyed,” she said.
Crosby Dove, a real estate agent whose firm focuses on architect-designed properties, was working with Keller to sell the home, which was listed for $8 million. “I’ve been looking at important houses from Frank Lloyd Wright to Frank Gehry for over 50 years, and I consider this one of the 10 most creative works of architecture I’ve ever seen,” Dove said. Have seen,” Doe said.
Not far from the Keller House, a wooden bridge house sitting on concrete ledges on a curve of Sunset Boulevard was also confirmed to have been burned by two people on the scene. Its architect, Robert Bridges, now an emeritus professor at the USC Marshall School of Business, built the house in 1974, and it has since stood as a monument to the structural daring of the area’s buildings. “It may sound uncertain, but it’s not,” Bridges told The Times in a 2014 article. “From an engineering standpoint, this thing makes perfect sense.”
These losses are being felt far beyond the Palisades. In Altadina, the Eaton fire has already claimed two cultural treasures: 1907 Zane Gray Statethe Mediterranean-style residence of one of California’s great Western novelists; And 1887 Andrew McNally House, A Queen Anne Money that was home to a map-making tycoon who co-founded Rand McNally.
Gray, who wrote such adventure stories as “Riders of the Purple Sage,” “Wildfire” and “The Rainbow Trail,” was drawn to Myron Hunt, the master architect who designed the Rose Bowl and the Ambassador Hotel. “It was just a huge landmark,” Fine said of the Zane Gray estate, adding that the conservancy had planned to hold its annual benefit there this year.
The attractions of the McNally House, designed by architect Frederick Rohrg, include its bell-shaped roof, blue-green shingles, Seven fireplaces and exquisitely eclectic period rooms, highlighted by the sumptuous Turkish room.
Not all buildings destroyed were architectural monuments. Some, like Malibu’s ramshackle Rail Inn (and beach favorites Gladstone’s and Moonshadow) and Altadena’s Fox’s cozy Red Range, were neighborhood institutions. The bungalow-style Topanga Ranch Motel was built in 1929 by none other than William Randolph Hearst. There was Altadena’s Bunny Museum, which housed more than 45,000 rabbit items, and the Pasadena Jewish Temple and Center, which stood for more than 80 years.
So now comes the anxious wait, to find out what else has dropped, and might. We refresh the fire maps, whose red outlines are very close to the love marks. Some of the world’s greatest architecture sits helplessly on this ledge.
Kappe has his famous residence in the Palisades, on a hillside in Rustic Canyon; Its concrete towers support a series of floating platforms, connected to the outside through large windows.
Of course, the revolutionary Ames House by Charles and Ray Eames, its colorful prefabricated panels epitomize the mid-century experience. It is bordered by modernist monuments, such as Rodney Walker’s Case Study House #18, Richard Neutra’s Case Study House #20 and Eero Saarinen’s Antenza House. Others in the evacuation zone include Frank Gehry’s New House on Adelaide Drive, his Schnabel House (1989) and Frank Lloyd Wright’s Sturges House (1939).
The fire, in its destructive fury, has highlighted Los Angeles’ magnificent architectural heritage – one that is often taken for granted, or even overlooked. They remind us that the city has long been one of the world’s great laboratories for residential architecture, and that its best buildings are masterpieces of art, and equally vulnerable to the ravages of nature. are weak.
Los Angeles will not be able to replace what is lost, and people may not even be allowed to rebuild on some of these sites. But it is possible to think more about what we want next, and how it can accomplish such extraordinary achievements.