Los Angeles is an expansive city that some look at in wonder: “Where is the continuity of design, here?”
The early city planners and architects must have had that wild-west pioneering mindset to kept venturing out to find willing townships and expansive farmlands and rancheros that would embrace their “new” design ideas. These were the entrepreneurs and developers who would never have embraced design by committee, as is dictated by today’s building and permit standards.
Today, the Los Angeles Megalopolis, known for its population diversity, could make a case of its architectural diversity and design by “community.
The Modern Design Diversity of Los Angeles’s Residential Communities
Traveling the city today, visitors are delighted to discover the designs of different communities across the landscape, from the Asian influence Pagoda designs of Downtown LA’s “Little Tokyo” and Hollywood’s Thai Town to the former’s west reimagined homes of Sawtell’sGarden District, now known as “Little Osaka.” Brentwood and Sullivan Canyon share the mid-century Post and Beam homes of A. Quincy Jones and iconic LA Ranch homes of Cliff May. These designs inspired builders throughout Los Angeles and into the San Fernando Valley, Woodland Hills, and Tarzana (which was named and initially developed by Tarzan, King of the Jungle). These homes styles proliferated.
The prize architectural homes (which can spark passionate debate), and unquestionably its most famous and well-known homes are the architectural pedigrees found in many of the Beverly Hills Mansions of “the flats:” Pick up a “Map to the Star Homes” or better yet, make a virtual stop to the Beverly Hills Historical Society website, www.beverlyhillshistoricalsociety.org, and tour the homes of Lucy and Desi Arnez, Jimmy and Gloria Stuart, Frank Sinatra, Madonna, and others.
People marvel at the home designs as they travel on these tours with the notable architects including, Paul R. Williams, Wallace Neff, Frank Lloyd Wright, Gerard Colcord, to name a few. When you venture north into the hills of Beverly Hills, you’ll see the transformative development of Paul Trousdale. The Trousdale Estates are found by climbing the steep roads and experiencing some of Los Angeles’s most expensive views. The original designs and noteworthy architectural Modern homes of Hal Levitt, Ed Fickett, Bob Ray Offenhauser, and Allen Siple are artfully revived today.
Discover more about the opportunities to own and experience the lifestyle and aesthetic rewards of fine architectural homes of Greater Los Angeles at www.michaelhiatthomes.com and www.sir.com.
