Tuesday, April 30, 2024

Frank Lloyd Wright at 150: Why his Los Angeles houses deserve a closer look Los Angeles Times

storer house

Of the entire complex, only the residence and two apartments were completed. The Storer House was built on a steep hillside in the Hollywood Hills. It was surrounded by jungle-like lush landscaping which gave the illusion of a hidden Mayan ruin.

Storer House, 8161 Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, CA

Frank Lloyd Wright's Textile Houses - ArchDaily

Frank Lloyd Wright's Textile Houses.

Posted: Tue, 14 Sep 2010 07:00:00 GMT [source]

If you want to know what it’s like inside, watch this video of Martha Stewart touring the house with Eric Wright. The Storer House is notable for its richly textured concrete walls and is the only of its kind to employ multiple patterns on its blocks (four in all). The house is about 3,000 square feet, with three bedrooms, three baths, and  two outdoor terraces. Perhaps two terraces was a thing for Wright, as all of his Los Angeles homes seem to have them. Inside, the living room acts as the home’s focal point, not the kitchen. The home has no formal front door, with the main entry actually in the back.

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Mrs. Edwin Cheney of Oak Park was Mamah (pronounced MAY-muh) Borthwick Cheney, known after her divorce from Mr. Cheney as Mamah Borthwick and to generations of Wright fans simply as Mamah. She met Wright when he designed a house for her and her husband in the same Chicago suburb where the architect lived with his wife, Catherine, and their six children. In 1984, the Los Angeles real estate firm of Mossler Randall and Doe offered the Storer House for an asking price of $790,000. Movie producer Joel Silver bought the house, and began a careful and costly $1 million restoration project in 1984; he remained in the house until selling it in 2002 for $2.9 million. (Silver, a Wright devotee, would go on to buy Wright's Wright’s Auldbrass Plantation in Beaufort County, SC, in 1986.) Silver added a swimming pool, a feature included in Wright's original plans, but skipped initially for cost reasons.

Location

storer house

The Storer House is a true masterpiece of modernist architecture, and it continues to inspire and captivate visitors from around the world. With its stunning views, innovative use of materials and light, and unique integration with its natural surroundings, the Storer House remains one of Los Angeles' most beloved architectural treasures. Many felt that a person of wealth wouldn’t be so inclined to live in a concrete block building. So that house eventually was bought by oil heiress Aline Barnsdall., who was known to be eccentric.

Features also include geometric leaded glass windows, custom light fixtures, concrete columns, coffered ceilings,  hardwood floors, and walls of mosaic tile. The Ennis House was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971. The landmarked residence has been featured in dozens of films, television shows, fashion shoots and music videos including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Twin Peaks, Mulholland Drive, and, most famously, 1982’s Blade Runner. Known for coining the term organic architecture, Wright based his work on the harmonious relationship between the structure, occupant, and the natural landscape. His houses were meant to seem as if they were natural extensions of the landscape itself. He created one of the most enduring design legacies in the United States and some of the most iconic structures in the world, from the Robie House and Fallingwater to the Guggenheim Museum to the eight houses featured below.

While the Storer House is a private residence and is not open to the public, visitors can admire its stunning exterior from the street. The home is located in the Hollywood Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, and it is easily accessible by car or bus. The Storer House has become a beloved symbol of modernist architecture in Los Angeles, and it is often visited by students of architecture and art. In 1971, the home was designated as a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument, and in 2008 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Frank Lloyd Wright Houses and Buildings in Los Angeles

Wright’s Prairie style was uniquely American, inspired by the flat plains of the Midwest, and essentially acted as the catalyst for Modern architecture. The style featured horizontal lines, open floor plans, cantilevered roofs, clerestory windows, unfinished materials, and the integration of interior and exterior environments. The Storer House is made of concrete blocks, which were a relatively new building material at the time.

Millard House, 1923

The Sturges family originally asked for a small house just big enough for two, thinking that Mrs. Sturges was unable to have children. Soon after they moved in, she conceived, and Wright altered the house plan to include a nursery. As Wright’s very first house in Southern California, it marked a change from the Prairie style he had explored in the American Midwest. The architect was now searching for a modern style suited specifically to Southern California. The home’s inclined upper walls and colonnades bear a similarity to the shapes of temples in Palenque – a Mayan city state in southern Mexico built during the seventh century AD. This residence marks one of the earliest examples of Mayan Revival, a modern architectural style that grew in the 1920s and 1930s.

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Wright used the concrete blocks to create a series of geometric patterns on the exterior of the house. The patterns are both decorative and functional, as they help to shade the house from the sun. Outside the living room, there are two terraces, one with a view of Hollywood and the other with a view of the hillside. The floor plan forms a T and has large public spaces, each with a fireplace. As with all of Wright’s textile block residences, the Ennis House featured a custom designed pattern.

There’s a reason he’s not known as “Los Angeles’s best architect” as one might call some of our mid-century masters like John Lautner, or Rudolph Schindler, Paul Williams, or even Wright’s own son, Lloyd Wright. The reason is because Wright’s body of work consisted of homes and structures all over the United States (not to mention abroad), including states like New York, New Jersey, Wisconsin, Arizona, and more. Wright’s oeuvre truly spans the globe and, in fact, he built just eight houses in LA. In honor of his masterpiece Ennis House hitting the market recently, we’ll take a closer look at Wright’s philosophy of organic architecture and all eight of his Los Angeles homes, masterpieces all. Wright used his signature style of "organic architecture" to design the Storer House, which is characterized by its use of natural materials and its integration with the surrounding environment. The home was designed to maximize the use of natural light and to create a sense of flow between the interior and exterior spaces.

Formally as well as constructionally built on this system, the Storer House follows a T-plan. The long arm - window lit all along both sides - contains the dining room at ground level and a double-height living room above, while the side arm includes the bedrooms and a terrace abutting the living room. Exploring the most sophisticated spatial concepts from across the globe. Discover innovative building techniques and materials available, worldwide. The Storer House was commissioned by John Storer, a prominent Los Angeles businessman, and his wife, Helen. Wright was hired to design a home that would reflect the couple's love of nature and their commitment to modernism.

The lot covers 79 acres, and the two-bedroom house is listed at 2,486 square feet. I know what you’re thinking, how could 79 acres in Malibu, literally a short stroll from Malibu Wines, be estimated at jsut $2.1 million? Wright was inspired by the ruins of Uxmal, Mexico and Mayan temples, and the home certainly feels like a religious experience when you go inside. The home consists of a main house and a smaller chauffeur’s quarters, which are separated by a paved motor court. The striking interior loggia has a mausoleum-like marble floor and links to the multi-level interior spaces. The grand living room has easy outdoor access through a pair of – what would you call these?

Mobile home: historic home gets a new lease on life - Seacoastonline.com

Mobile home: historic home gets a new lease on life.

Posted: Thu, 15 Nov 2012 08:00:00 GMT [source]

In 2002, Mr. Silver sold this iconic piece of Frank Lloyd Wright architecture for $2.9 million. In 2013, the John Storer House was once again listed on the market, and it sat there ignored, much like an older dog at a shelter. HABS/HAER/HALS materials have generally been scanned at high resolution that is suitable for most publication purposes (see Digitizing the Collection for further details about the digital images). The Storer House found at 8161 Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles is known for its drama. Although Wright believed in designing structures that blended seamlessly into their natural surroundings, this 3,000-square-foot house does anything but. In 1931, Pauline Schindler rented the Storer House after splitting from her husband, the Modernist architect R.M.

The house is built on a series of terraces, and the living room opens onto a large terrace with stunning views of the city. The Obolers lived in the gatehouse and other buildings for many years. After he died in 1987, Eleanor remained briefly on the property, then sold it to a new owner, who eventually planned to restore the buildings . The buildings are in sad shape and are still being prepared for restoration. The interior of the Retreat has been stripped to check the structure after a fire. In July 2018, real estate website Zillow estimated its value at $2.1 million.

Carlton doused the house with gasoline and, after setting it aflame, stood by the one unlocked door and attacked the victims with a hatchet as they rushed to escape the fire. Yet the five Los Angeles houses Wright produced in the early 1920s remain underappreciated and largely misunderstood. (They’re mentioned only in passing in the catalog for the MoMA show.) In part this is because of how anomalous they were — both for Wright and the region.

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