The Roberts Ranch House...or remains

Here's something different...these are the remains of a historic house in Malibu. The house was originally built in 1952 and designed by Paul Williams, a famous African American architect (the first certified African American architect west of the Mississippi). The house burned down in a fire in 1982, but the ruins are still accessible through a trail in Solstice Canyon off of the Pacific Coast Highway. It provides an interesting opportunity to walk through the floor plan of a once spectacular, privately-owned home. The scenery is fantastic, especially the waterfall!

The Schwimmer House

Last summer the Hammer Museum on Wilshire Blvd. (in conjunction with the MAK Center) had an exhibition called Between Earth and Heaven: the Architecture of John Lautner. It featured drawings, models, videos, and photographs of various John Lautner projects. The exhibition also included tours of actual John Lautner homes around Los Angeles on several different weekends, some open to anyone who wanted to buy a ticket and some by invitation only. The visitors would arrive at the museum on a given day at a specific time, and then be bussed to one or several of the homes. I volunteered to be a docent for this event and I was assigned to the Schwimmer House in Beverly Hills. It's also a private residence, so I was pretty lucky to be able see the inside of the house (and for free!). I'm planning on taking a drive at some point to find the rest of the Lautner buildings in LA (especially Chemosphere!!)...anyone interested??

L.A. Murals

For my Materials Preservation class during the fall '08 quarter, I had to write a paper on murals in Los Angeles. Just thought I'd post some of the pictures =)

Off of Melrose:







somewhere on Melrose:




7566 Melrose Ave.





Hollywood High School
Highland & Selma
Eloy Torrez, Portrait of Hollywood:






Russell & Vermont, Los Feliz:








Kingswell & Vermont, Los Feliz
Monte Thrasher:







Wilcox & Hollywood Blvd.
Thomas Suriya, You Are the Star: