Browse Items (856 total)

Theosophy was a religion that began in the United States in the late 1800s as a mix of esoteric Spiritualism, occult influences, and adaptation various Asian religions. The Krotona Institute started in the Beechwood Canyon area of Los Angeles in…

The La Jolla Beach and Yacht Club was a large-scale commission for Stacy-Judd after his success with the Aztec Hotel in Monrovia. For the Club, he created a more subdued theme, with triangular shaped window openings, adobe-style exterior walls, and…

This house possibly located on San Vicente in Santa Monica, features a board and batten exterior, painted light green. Unusual features include a large circular front door and a flat-roofed house volume contrasting with a more traditional gabled…

The Carey house is a fascinating study of architectural vision versus reality. The rendering of the house is in the "Mayan" style, reminiscent of Stacy-Judd's Aztec Hotel. The photographs of the completed house show a much more subdued and modest…

Robert Stacy-Judd worked for the railroad in England, then moved to the United States and worked for the Great Northern Railroad in North Dakota. After a couple of years, he started his own practice in Minot. The Central Block was originally designed…

The founder of the Philosophical Research Society, Manely P. Hall, had commissioned buildings by Stacy-Judd previously, due to their shared interest in Mayan design. The Library in the Philosophical Research Society was designed to hold the many rare…

As travel by personal car became more feasible during the 1920s, the mountains surrounding Los Angeles on the east became weekend getaways for residents. The use of hot springs for relaxation and to cure various ailments was a popular attraction. The…

The pair of bungalows for Dr. H. Gale Atwater were part of a larger swath of land owned by Atwater along Avon Park Terrace, adjacent to Elysian Park. Atwater had previously built another "Hopi-style" house on the property, and commissioned Stacy-Judd…

This church building is widely regarded as one of the premier examples of Mayan Revival style architecture. It was declared a city landmark in 1975, and placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2009. The exterior steeple is stepped up…

Robert Stacy-Judd was an architect, archeologist, and tireless promoter of himself and his work. These portraits exhibit how his persona of Mayan explorer informed his architectural explorations.

After the Hoover Dam was built in the mid-1930s, Lake Mead became a popular recreation area. Stacy-Judd put forth a proposal to the National Park Service for three tourist areas: Boulder Beach, Lost City, and Pierce Ferry.

The handwritten caption…

The Morris Plan Bank was a national banking system which primarily loaned money to middle-class people who had trouble obtaining regular loans. The Bank was started in Virginia in 1910, and soon had locations all across the country, including Los…

The house Robert Stacy-Judd designed and built for himself and his first wife is a modified Swiss Chalet style house. It has a raised floor plan, where the main living area is on the second floor, with bedrooms and integrated garage on the lower…

The unbuilt "Streets of All Nations" project was designed as a large-scale commercial enterprise. Stacy-Judd designed restaurants, motels, theaters, churches and temples, art galleries, and residences all grouped by country and architectural style.…

Twin Lakes Park was a resort development featuring two man-made lakes. Stacy-Judd designed the entrance gate in Mayan style, on the aptly named Mayan Road. He also designed the clubhouse and a few "Aztec" style cabins.
Unfortunately, the lakes have…

The National Hall project, for the client Paramount Group, was a group of buildings two city blocks square, at the corner of Sunset and Vine in Hollywood. The project was to include a 23,000 seat auditorium, a 13-story department store, office…

The plot plan for the first floor of the Materials Research Lab building shows the intricacies of fitting new buildings into the campus. The original Engineering building is immediately to the south, with an access road, pedestrian and bike paths…

The house for Edward Heath in San Marino (also listed as Pasadena), has some characteristics of a Regency style home, with an unusual double-height porch.

The Joseph Campbell house in Pasadena is one of Roland Coate's earliest solo commissions. This Andalusian style home has some Spanish accents.

This house for Jack Warner (one of the founding brothers in Warner Brothers Studios), was an alteration of and addition to an existing house. The Georgian style mansion with a Greek-style portico featured interior design by William Haines and…

Oil company executive Leigh Battson was married to Lucy Doheny and living at the Greystone Mansion in Beverly Hills when they commissioned Coate to design a vacation home on Lake Arrowhead. The estate featured steeply sloping roofs which prevented…

Coate built this house for Mrs. H.C. Lippiatt and Mrs. F.M.P. Taylor in a Colonial Revival style, with influences of Spanish, Monterey, and New Orleans styles. The house backs onto the Bel Air Country Club golf course, and is close to the campus of…

This large house in the Mid-Wilshire neighborhood of Los Angeles was built for Lemuel Goldwater, a garment industry pioneer and relative of Senator Barry Goldwater.

Roland Coate designed and built this beach house for his family in the Emerald Bay area of Laguna Beach.

This house for Frank Hickman is located near the campus of UC Los Angeles in the "Little Holmby" area of Westwood.

The area of South Los Angeles known as Leimert Park was developed in the late 1920s by Walter Leimert, and was one of the first planned communities in Southern California. The neighborhood was landscaped by the Olmstead Brothers, and in addition to…

The house for Rudolph and Caroline Liebig is located on a large flat lot in the Bel Air section of Los Angeles.

This Spanish Colonial Revival style house was built on a large lot in San Marino for O. Nicholas Gabriel.

Coate designed this large house for movie producer Arthur Hornblow Jr and his second wife, actress Myrna Loy.

This large Monterey-style house was designed for A Parley Johnson and his wife Geline "Gypsy" Johnson. They were citrus growers, and the house was originally surrounded by 50 acres of orange groves.
It was listed on the National Register of…

This house for Herbert Allen Jr. is located in the Oak Knoll neighborhood of Pasadena.

This Monterey Colonial style house was designed by Coate for business executive Lionel M. Armstrong.

This large Spanish Colonial style house was erected on San Leandro Lane for a Mrs. Dorothy D. Cotton.

This church was one of Coate's early solo commissions, after leaving the firm Johnson, Kaufmann and Coate. It is also one of his few church commissions. The structure is a very good example of Spanish Colonial Revival style, which was very popular in…

The M.G. Eshman house in Bel Air is a very good example of a classic American Colonial Revival style house. Sited on a large flat lot, the house is just down the street from the famous Hotel Bel-Air.

This house was built for Eva J.K. Fudger, daughter of a citrus rancher and wife of a Toronto businessman. Fudger had been living across the street when she commissioned Coate to build this house with a view towards the adjacent Wilshire Country Club.…

This large house, on a prominent hill overlooking the Bel Air Country Club was commissioned by petroleum executive David C. and Irene Norcross. The house features many Monterey Revival influences, as well as some intricate ironwork on a double-height…

Irene Mayer and David C. Selznick, a well-known movie producer, commissioned this house from Coate at the height of the great depression. The house was a Georgian Revival on a large lot in the center of Beverly Hills, surrounded by other movie…

Real estate investor Jacob Stern commissioned this house from Coate in 1928. The over 9000 square foot estate was designed in the Mediterranean Revival style, on a 2.2 acre parcel of land. The 30 room mansion was sited on the crown of a hill,…

This house is a departure from Coate's Spanish and Monterey Revival style. Built for industrialist Ira L. Bryner and his wife Margaret, the house was sited on an irregular hillside lot and bore the hallmarks of a Georgian Revival, with some Colonial…

The John E. Barber house is an early example of Coate's Monterey Revival style-- a second story balcony, center hall, with the majority of rooms opening onto outside space. Grayson C. and John Edwin Barber were a well-to-do and prominent Pasadena…

This house, an interpretation of a Monterey style house, was one of Coate's earliest commissions as a solo architect, after the dissolution of the Johnson, Kaufmann, and Coate partnership. Stafford W. Bixby was a descendant of early California…

The owners of a successful furniture business, Frank and Ruth Wilmot Cowlishaw commissioned Coate to design a large ranch house and stables for their 640 acre working ranch in Arizona. The house was L shaped and centered around a pool in the back of…

The blueprints for the elevations of the Director's House (House A) show the Prairie influence on Wright's design. With a long row of clearstory windows, concrete walls, and horizontal lines, the house clearly shows the Wright design. Wright brought…

The James Eads How house in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles, is sited on top of a ridge, with views of the San Fernando Valley. The house at 2400 square feet, is large for a Schindler, and is built with center-cut redwood and poured concrete.…

The original idea for the Barnsdall site was that it was to have an on-site theater, housing for actors and staff, as well as the main house. The Director's House, also referred to as House A was designed by Wright and built with Schindler as the…

Some of the hallmarks of Schindler's later works can be seen in these interior photographs. The built-in furniture, focus on natural light, and the use of wood on the walls and ceiling are architectural details seen throughout his career in various…

This photograph of the exterior of the house shows the growth of landscaping along the front and patio areas.

The James B. Irving house was a temporary home designed by Schindler while he was employed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Schindler designed the home quickly, after Irving requested a temporary home since his had been destroyed by a tornado.
The Irvings…

Schindler was working for Frank Lloyd Wright when Thomas Hardy commissioned a series of 18 worker houses near Racine, Wisconsin.

The Bethlehem Baptist Church on South Compton Avenue in Los Angeles is Schindler's only religious structure. It is one of very few examples of modern architecture in South Los Angeles. The African-American church congregation commissioned Schindler…

The house designed for writer Rose Harris was built on top of a rocky ridge in the Laurel Canyon area of Los Angeles. The steep hillside site provided an unobstructed view down the canyon, but the footprint of the house was small, due to the…

This house in the Studio City area of Los Angeles, was built in 1941 for Samuel and Yolanda Goodwin. The two-bedroom plus den house is sited on a street-to-street lot, with views of the valley.

This very early work of Schindler was done while he was still in the employ of the Chicago architecture firm Otternheim, Stern, and Reichert, just prior to Schindler leaving to work for Frank Lloyd Wright at Taliesin. Built at Buena Avenue and…

The Maurice Kallis house is sited on a north-facing slope in Studio City, with a wide view of the San Fernando Valley. The house originally contained a separate apartment and detached artist studio, but is now a single family home.

This desert house for Maryon (also listed as Marian) Toole, is located in Palm Desert, which at the time was an unincorporated area known as Palm Village. It features stone walls with wood framing, large glass walls and clerestory windows to let in…

The reception room / salon interior design for Helena Rubinstein by Schindler was for a building on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue. Helena Rubinstein, the cosmetics entrepreneur, also commissioned Shindler to design a salon in…

The house for John DeKeyser (also spelled de Keysor), is a duplex with a two bedroom unit on the top floor and a one bedroom unit on the lower floor.
This house is just one house away from the Frank Lloyd Wright Freeman house, on the hill above.

The Adolphe Tischler house, on a sloping hillside in the Westwood area of Los Angeles, has a street facade that is reminiscent of the prow of a ship. The street level contained a carport and artist's workshop, while the main entrance and living space…

This Schindler drawing of a wading pool and pergola on the Olive Hill grounds dates from 1925. Schindler continued to work for Barnsdall after she fired Wright, and the pool and pergola are examples of the ongoing work on the property.

In 1925, Schindler altered Aline Barnsdall's bedroom and ensuite bathroom in the Hollyhock House. He altered the layout of the bathroom and paneled the walls and ceiling in oak. Schindler also altered the bedroom for Aline's daughter. These interior…

In 1914, the Chicago Architectural Club held a competition to design a neighborhood civic complex. This was Schindler's entry, featuring a very clean lines and a rectilinear plan.

The distinctive A-frame shape of the Gisela Bennati cabin is possibly one of the earliest uses of the style as a residence in the United States. The steeply pitched roof is a very good choice for the Lake Arrowhead region, since the lake is at a high…

The housing development for Gould and Bandini was a series of small houses for single workers or small families. This project was never built.

This rendering of Harriman's Colony is a birds-eye view of a planned community, possibly in San Gabriel. The client, Job Harriman was a lawyer and ran for mayor of Los Angeles in 1911 as a socialist. After his failed mayoral bid, Harriman started a…

In the 1920s the 'bungalow court' was a common form of affordable housing in the Los Angeles region. With small units lining the sides of a city lot, perpendicular to the street, a courtyard is formed between the units. This style allowed each unit…

The apartment complex for Ted Falk at the corner of Lucile and Carnation avenues in Los Angeles, is one of the more complex designs for a Schindler apartment building. The four apartments are set on an irregular-shaped lot, on a steeply sloping hill.…

The Charles H. and Ethel Wolfe house was a single-family house with views of Avalon Bay, ocean, and natural landscapes. The mezzanine level was the street level and included the garage, small bedroom with full bath, kitchen, terrace, and living room…

This twelve unit complex of duplexes, built for San Diego dentist W.L. Lloyd, showcased how Schindler was able to incorporate many of his modern plans into a multi-unit complex. Each unit had a ground floor living area, outdoor garden space, and an…

These photographs capture Schindler at the construction site for the Walker house and in a more composed setting later in life.

The small, square house for Paul Popenoe and his wife contained two bedrooms, a bathroom, and the exterior walls were ringed with porches that could be covered to act as sleeping porches and an extension of the living space. A central living area…

Dr. Philip Lovell was a doctor who commissioned multiple projects from Schindler, including his beach house in Newport Beach. This cabin in Wrightwood was to be a simple weekend getaway cabin for the doctor and his wife Leah and their family. The…

The Laurelwood Apartments were the last grouping of apartments Schindler designed before he died. The complex of twenty two-bedroom, one-bath apartments is set on a sloping lot, with each apartment having either a private patio or terrace and a…

At the time Schindler submitted a design for the Bergen Branch of the Free Public Library Competition in Jersey City, New Jersey, he was working for Frank Lloyd Wright in Oak Park, Illinois.
Schindler did not win the competition, and was not even…

Schindler designed preliminary sketches for this high-rise office tower for the Frank Meline Company. The Photoplay building featured a top floor clubhouse for the Photoplayers, which included a ballroom/dining room, men's and women's lounges, a…

The Mackey apartments were designed in 1939 for Pearl Mackey. Three apartments were rented out, with the fourth, a two-story penthouse, was for Mrs. Mackey herself. Each unit had a different layout, and included built-in furniture, outdoor spaces,…

The Manola Court apartments were designed by Schindler for his friend Herman Sachs, on a steep hillside in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles. Sachs was the muralist and painter of the interiors for LA landmarks such as City Hall, Union Station, and…

Rudolph Schindler first worked with Aline Barnsdall on the Hollyhock House, when Frank Lloyd Wright sent Schindler to California from Illinois to supervise the construction while Wright went to Japan to work on the Imperial Hotel. Schindler continued…

This "Country house in adobe" for Dr. Thomas P. Martin was one of Schindler's earliest designs in the United States. After spending one week touring Taos, Schindler was influenced by the adobe and pueblo structures in the town.

The beach house for Henry Braxton and his wife Viola Brothers Shore was to be sited along the ocean in the Venice Beach area of Los Angeles. The three story house (with sleeping porch and deck on the roof) was never built. Braxton was an art dealer…

The house for William Oliver in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles is set on a steep lot, with views to the ocean and mountains. The garage is at street level, and the house is above, at a 45 degree angle to take advantage of the views and access the…

The beach colony with semi-circular beach cottages was planned for Santa Monica and possibly named the "Cabania City Project" by A.E. Rose. One prototype beach cottage was built, but the rest of the colony was not constructed.

This hillside house in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles was built for Elizabeth Van Patten and two other women, as three separate apartments with communal areas. Schindler also designed the furniture for the house.

Roxy Roth was a screenwriter and actor who commissioned Schindler to design a house in the Studio City area of Los Angeles. The house is on an irregular-shaped lot, with a curved driveway/covered garage with an entrance and exit. The house is sited…

The house Schindler designed for Ralph G. Walker overlooks the Silverlake reservoir on a steeply sloping site. The three bedroom, two bath house is a series of interlocking planes and cubes, with clerestory windows and expansive views. Schindler…

This house alteration for J.B. Lee was in the Chicago suburb of Maywood. The project was completed by Schindler when he worked for the architecture firm Ottenheimer Stern and Reichert.

The house for Milton and Ruth Shep was designed to sit on a steep slope in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles. Ruth Shep also commissioned Schindler to design furniture for the house.

This house for poet Ellen Janson, is perched on the edge of a cliff, high in the Hollywood Hills area of Los Angeles. Janson was a modernist poet, and is widely considered Schindler's last girlfriend.

The Robert and Mariana Erlik house was built in the Hollywood Hills section of Los Angeles in the early 1950s.

Hilaire Hiler was a well-known artist in the United States and Europe in the 1920s and 1930s. He commissioned Schindler to build this house and studio, just off of Sunset Boulevard. The house was torn down in the 1960s.

The beach house for Alexander "Sasha" Kaun and his wife Valeria was featured in many architecture magazines in the 1930s as an example of a small, inexpensive house. Kaun was a professor of Slavic languages at UC Berkeley and his wife was a famous…

This large (3700 square feet) house was built in Canoga Park for actor Albert Van Dekker and his family. The three-level house sits under an unusual copper roof.
The Van Dekker house was declared a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument in 2009.

The beach house commissioned by Phillip Lovell is widely regarded as one of the best examples of modernist architecture by Schindler. With rough, exposed, concrete forms, open staircases, two story living room, and windows facing the ocean, the beach…

Anastasia Bubeshko and her daughter Luby commissioned Schindler to design an apartment complex on Griffith Park Boulevard in the Silverlake neighborhood in Los Angeles. They wanted a modular design on the sloping lot, one which could contain 5…

Schindler designed the interior of the restaurant for Adolph Edward Brandstatter, including the furnishings. The restaurant, on Hollywood Boulevard near Vine, was popular with the Hollywood movie stars. It was originally open 24 hours per day and…

Exterior photograph of house at 835 Kings Road, Los Angeles, Calif. taken shortly after construction. At the time it was built, the area was unincorporated, now it is in the heart of West Hollywood, surrounded by large apartment buildings. The…

Photograph of the sliding door leading out into the patio garden. It highlights the soffit and exposed beams of the roof, and the wide opening created by the sliding glass and wood door. The concept of indoor/outdoor living is showcased with chairs…

A photograph of Rudolph Schindler (right), with Richard Neutra (left), and Dionne Neutra with child (seated), in front of the Kings Road house. The Neutra's lived in the house from 1925 until 1930.

Floor plan of the house showing the unusual arrangement of rooms. Instead of the usual living room, dining room, and bedrooms, this plan shows the four live/work spaces for Schindler, his wife Pauline, Clyde Chace, and his wife Marian Chace. Each…

Graphite and colored pencil drawings of exterior elevations and sections. This drawing shows the front, rear, and side elevations, as well as the section views. It also has an exterior rendering of the house in the lower right-hand corner of the…