Posted on 02/07/2025 10:26:59 AM PST by nickcarraway
Some of California's architectural wonders were consumed by the flames.
It's been more than three weeks since the beginning of the Los Angeles area wildfires and the level of devastation is overwhelming. The numbers are stark: The fires killed 28 people and incinerated more than 16,000 structures. Officials peg the economic damage at $150 billion or more, with insurance companies expecting losses of $30 billion.
We've also seen the heartbreaking images of our fellow Californians combing through the wreckage looking for their beloved pets and remnants of their lives. My wife is a Red Cross volunteer and I can't stand hearing the tragic stories after she returns from a service call.
In this fast-paced social-media-dominated world, we all jump to various policy conclusions. I've done so myself, as I've ruminated in previous columns about the various insurance, land use, wildfire prevention, and water policies that exacerbated the situation. These are important issues and need to be hashed out, especially as the state and federal governments consider aid packages and regulatory relief to speed up the rebuilding process.
But sometimes it's best to step back and just react in a human way, by mourning the losses. And boy have there been some major ones, especially on the architectural front. Early on, I experienced something of a panic when I read reports that some of LA's most notable architectural treasures had been destroyed or were threatened. Fortunately, many reports were incorrect.
"Some early news coverage and social-media chatter implied that the TCL Chinese Theatre, Hollywood Bowl, and Magic Castle were close to burning when, in fact, those spots never were in immediate danger," the Los Angeles Times reported. It noted rumors (thankfully untrue) that the spectacular midcentury Eames house had burned. Pasadena's Gamble House—the most notable Arts-and-Crafts style home in the nation—reportedly was threatened but also survived.
Other treasures were not so fortunate. Fires claimed the Benedict and Nancy Freedman House, a modernist masterpiece designed by architect Richard Neutra in 1949. Also lost: 21 of 28 of architect Gregory Ain's Park Planned Homes in Altadena. Also dating to the 1940s, "This was one of the first modernist housing developments in the country," per US Modernist, conceived "as a groundbreaking social experiment, with affordable prefabricated homes for working families."
These treasures are irreplaceable, even if new buildings are rebuilt on the sites. I have a particular love of modernism and the midcentury variety, with their dramatic, earthy details (atriums, beams, aggregate concrete floors, innovative materials, etc.). I live in one of the Sacramento area's largest neighborhoods of such homes. I can only imagine Altadena residents' sense of loss.
When I moved to the Los Angeles area from the Midwest in the 1990s, I was smitten by the beauty of the place. Southern Californians often complain about congestion and occasional blight, but there's just something about those lovely hillsides, swaying palm trees, and views of the mountains and beaches. And I loved the plethora of modernist and Spanish Revival architecture, which defined the areas most prone to fire and mudslides.
I grew up on the East Coast in an area of colonial-era stone and brick houses and appreciate them for their solid construction and understated beauty. I owned a craftsman house in Iowa, with its solid oak detailing. These homes were a reaction to the fussy detailing of the previous Victorian era. I also owned an Art Deco home in Ohio, which managed to be historic and futuristic at the same time, as it epitomized a 1930s-era vision of the future.
Architecture is important. Buildings matter. That's one of my beefs with the modern urbanist movement, which seems committed to packing as many people as efficiently as possible into little boxes. Yet it's hard to convey the sense of joy one can experience from living in a house that was thoughtfully designed. There's no replacing a burned-down historic treasure. Of course, the loss of anyone's home or business—architecturally significant or not—is painful.
Some of the major architectural victims of the LA wildfires: the Will Rogers Ranch House, the Altadena Community Church, the 1887 Queen-Anne-style Andrew McNally House in Altadena, the Keeler House in Pacific Palisades and others. The New York Times correctly summed up these losses as a "hit to 'Old California'" and to "L.A.'s spectacular design legacy." The former reminds us of the state when it was still a frontier and the latter is the result of California's culture of experimentation.
"A lot of people have lost their lives, but for the community, we've lost these things that we feel are part of our common history and part of our heritage, and that's been really hard," noted architecture writer Sam Lubell. "It has also reminded me…what a phenomenal heritage that is."
Indeed. As California regulators and builders gear up for the rebuilding, here's hoping they allow and create new buildings that are worth mourning if we ever lose them.
It’s a small price to pay to keep our forestry in it’s natural state, untouched by evil humans
Sierra Club
Just a handful or two.
Sadly, it only survived because a lot of fire fighting resources were diverted to protect it.
As a consequence, a lot of other homes and businesses burned down instaed.
The Sierra Club loves forest fires.
And yet...there is always a “silver lining” for every tragedy.
The Delta Smelt continue to thrive...
In fact, at our Super Bowl party we will be serving “Filet of Smelt”...
Some of the surviving structures were due to preparedness rather than luck or diverting resources. I don’t know about the Museum as it wasn’t in danger when I was reading about it, but the Ghetty Center was and was a wonder world of being prepared before anything happened. They knew of the danger and did everything every one else couldn’t afford to do to prepare for it, including grounds preparation and interior ventilation systems. It was BRILLIANT work to save centuries of treasures and worth every penny spent to save it.
Author concludes: “...here’s hoping they allow and create new buildings that are worth mourning if we ever lose them”
Modern architecture is horrible. Absolutely horrible. The nation has been swept by an insane rethinking of roofs. They are all now shed roofs with crazy quilt dormers and roofline intersections. It is all jarring and not harmonious one bit. A developer neighbor added a second home to his lot next to us built in that jarring, industrial park / firehouse style. “Ugly” doesn’t begin to describe it. Modern architects are enthralled with “brutalism” that arose in Germany in the 1950s with roots back to the 20s. This residential design fad seems to be “Son of Brutalism.”
I have no doubt that the planners in Pacific Palisades and Altadena will somehow make the towns very ugly. The fashion-forward architects will all swoon over it. People will buy it. And as soon as it is built it will be ugly and worthy of immediately tearing it down. There will be nothing uplifting, beautiful or expressive of hope built.
We are deeply saddened by the loss of humper biden’s artwork.
Who cares? The commie-rats keep it all locked up.
It still required a huge diversion of fire fighting resources to keep it from burning down. In fact, that part of the fire protection plan.
The Ghetty is filled with priceless and irreplaceable artifacts, but we will never know how much equally important and irreplaceable art work, historical documents, antique classic cars and vintage exotic sports cars burned down in Palisades.
The cost of the homes burned in Palisades pales in comparison to some of the priceless things that burned down in the homes.
I‘m sorry, but brutalism originated mainly in Britain. Yes, the Bauhaus movement, which originated in Germany, was its godfather, but not brutalism.
The brutalist style was, I think, also a thing of necessity to some degree. After the war, many materials were scarce, so the hideous sight of these buildings was not just due to a neo-communist delight in ugliness.
Will Rogers’s wonderful home near Malibu.
You build a house within a fire plain, it gets burned
A friend of mine lost a mentioned house near the great Will Rogers’ place
Perhaps it's just me...
Actually, it’s not in it’s natural state. In many California forests, small fires are part of the natural ecology. And suppressing that leads to worse fires.
Private works of art lost is a disaster. But works that are saved for the public are MUCH more important and I would totally support firefighting resources to public collections of such importance. And hope that private treasures were insured and photographed and those historical remnants saved in fireproof vaults. ALWAYS save public treasures.
“the spectacular midcentury Eames house survived”
I was worried about that house. Went there to interview Charles Eames for a magazine story I was writing. Gorgeous house and Charles and his wife had it filled with furniture thay designed. I had a couple of pieces of commercially produced furniture they designed in my apartment. Wish I’d kept it, but I moved too many times and sold it. I know for sure that a particular chair I had recently sold for $7,000.
Other people here might have some connection to people and homes in that horrible, preventable fires. So terribly sad.
Those are just things. The real treasure is the fires proved they lost their rights, control of the the government, and their ever loving minds too!
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