mid century tour los angeles

3 Mid-Century Homes You Can Visit In Los Angeles

As anyone with an appreciation for great architecture knows, photographs, no matter how stunning, only tell part of the story. To truly appreciate a great building you have to experience it – how it is sited in the landscape, the flow of spaces and play of natural light, the contrast of finishes and textures. It’s not just about how a building looks, but how it feels, how it works as a space for living.

Fortunately, many significant Mid-century modern homes have been preserved as house museums and are open to the public for tours throughout the year. Others, which continue to be inhabited as private residences are opened by their owners once a year for events such as Modernism Week in Palm Springs, California, and Sydney Open, in Sydney, Australia.

Here are three significant Mid-century modern homes you can tour and experience in Los Angeles,to gain a full understanding of the innovation and beauty of their design.

Eames House, Pacific Palisades, California

(Photo by Michael Locke )

The Eames House, Case Study House #8 , was designed by Charles and Ray Eames, who moved into the house in 1949 and lived there for the remainder of their lives. Sensitively sited in a beautiful meadow, the house offered the couple a space where work, play, life and nature could coexist. The interiors remain intact, much as they were in the Eames’ lifetimes.

You can book a self-guided exterior tour of the Eames House, a full interior tour and even a picnic for four in the Eames’ beloved meadow. For more information check the  Eames Foundation  site.

Stahl House, Hollywood, California

(Photo via James Vaughan )

Case Study House #22, the Stahl House is sited on a cliff high above Hollywood and its pioneering use of glass and steel in its geometry and symmetry reflects the gridlines of the streets below. The iconic house, completed in 1960, was designed for Buck and Carlotta Stahl by ingenious young architect Pierre Koenig, the only architect the Stahl’s approached daring enough to consider the cantilevered foundation that is so awe-inspiring today.

For tour reservations, visit the Stahl House site.

Richard Neutra VDL House, Los Angeles, California

In 1940, Viennese-American architect Richard Neutra received a no-interest loan from Dutch philanthropist Dr C. H. Van Der Leeuw to build a truly radical glass house with rooftop and balcony gardens to accommodate his office and two families on a small 60 x 70 foot lot. Neutra named it the VDL Research House after his benefactor and over a 30-year period hundreds of significant architectural projects on four continents were designed here.

Tours are available of the VDL House every Saturday from 11am to 3pm, for details visit the Neutra VDL site. 

How a Tiny 42sf Eichler Became a Boutique Haven

Reinventing Modernism in Palm Springs

Combined Shape .st0{fill-rule:evenodd;clip-rule:evenodd;fill:#fff} .st0{fill-rule:evenodd;clip-rule:evenodd;fill:#fff} SMS Main navigation Things to Do Attractions & Tours Arts & Culture Outdoors & Wellness Shopping Budget Family Hidden Gems Luxury Pet-Friendly Eat & Drink Bars Clubs Dine LA Restaurant Week Restaurants Business Spotlight Find Events Itineraries Where to Stay Celebrate LA Heritage AAPI Heritage Black LA Latino Heritage LGBTQ+ Tourist Information Meetings About LA Tourism Travel Trade Membership Business Spotlight Media Research Careers Today's must read Hidden Gems of Los Angeles Log in Search Search Things to Do Arts & Culture Discover the Landmark Houses of Los Angeles From Mid-Century Modern icons to LA's first World Heritage Site

Marion Davies House - Annenberg Beach House

The site that is currently known as the Annenberg Community Beach House was originally a five-acre oceanfront property belonging to William Randolph Hearst and his mistress, Marion Davies. The lavish compound was designed in the Georgian Colonial-style by architects Julia Morgan and William Flannery and featured a three-story main house, three detached guest houses, servants' quarters, dog kennels, tennis courts and two swimming pools. The legendary parties held at the compound during Hearst and Davies’ tenure had guest lists that often numbered in the thousands. Luminaries such as Howard Hughes, Clark Gable, Charlie Chaplin, Bette Davis, Carole Lombard, Cary Grant, Winston Churchill, and Gloria Swanson all spent time at the massive estate at one time or another.

The site operated as the popular Sand & Sea Club for decades, then sat vacant and boarded up for years until the city of Santa Monica announced plans to renovate and reopen it as a public beach facility. Renowned philanthropist Wallis Annenberg donated $27.5 million to the cause. During the renovation, all of the remaining original structures from the Hearst days were demolished, except for a 110-foot Italian marble swimming pool and one of the guest homes, now known as the Marion Davies Guest House . The Annenberg Community Beach House opened to the public in April 2009. The site is open daily and is also used as a special events/wedding venue and filming location.

Neutra VDL Studio and Residences

The only Richard Neutra-designed house that is now open regularly to the public, the Neutra VDL Studio and Residences is a Silver Lake hidden gem that was built by the famed architect in 1932. He ran his practice out of a studio here, and along with his wife Dione, raised three sons in this house, which he designed to demonstrate that Modernist principles could be enjoyed by less affluent clients, while maintaining privacy. Natural light, glass walls, patios and mirrors are hallmarks of the Neutra VDL House. Tours of the property, given by Cal Poly Pomona architecture students, are offered on Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

In January 2017, the Neutra VDL Studio and Residences was added to the National Register of Historic Places. The U.S. Department of the Interior press release describes Neutra as "a nationally and internationally seminal figure of the twentieth century Modern movement in architecture" and the VDL Research House as "the only property where one can see the progression of his style over a period of years and is among the key properties to understanding the national significance of Richard Neutra.”

Schindler House

When this residential house was built by Vienna-born Rudolf Schindler back in1922 - inspired by a recent trip to Yosemite with his wife - it was extremely unconventional at the time for a place to live. In reality, it was meant to be a cooperative live-work space between two families, much like a camp site. Having been the residence of the Schindlers and then other creatives, this WeHo hidden gem is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is open to the public Wednesday through Sunday as an architectural center.

Stahl House

The Stahl House (aka Case Study House #22) was designed by architect Pierre Koenig and built in 1959. Perched in the Hollywood hills above the city, the Stahl House is an icon of Mid-Century Modern architecture. A 1960 black and white photograph by Julius Shulman, showing two women leisurely sitting in a corner of the house with panoramic views through floor-to-ceiling glass walls, is one of the most famous architectural photos in history and a quintessential Los Angeles image. In 2016, TIME named Shulman's photo one of the 100 Most Influential Images of All Time .

The Stahl House was declared Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #670 in 1999. In 2007, the American Institute of Architects (AIA) listed the Stahl House as one of the top 150 structures on its "America's Favorite Architecture" list, one of only 11 in Southern California, and the only private residence on the list. The Stahl House was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2013.

Discover LA Newsletter

10 Iconic Mid-Century Homes in Los Angeles

Los Angeles, often referred to as the epicenter of architectural innovation, boasts a rich history of mid-century modern homes. These have left an indelible mark on the world of design and continue to inspire architects and enthusiasts alike. Also, these homes , characterized by their clean lines, open spaces, and seamless integration with nature, emerged as a response to the post-World War II era and have since become timeless icons of modern living.

In this article, we will explore ten of the most famous mid-century homes in Los Angeles that have helped shape the city’s architectural identity.

• The Stahl House
• The Eames House
• The Bass House
• The Lovell Health House
• The Sheats-Goldstein Residence
• The Kaufmann House
• Case Study #20: The Bailey House
• Case Study #16: A Serene Oasis in Bel Air
• The Schindler House
• Case Study #21: The Bailey House

1. The Stahl House: A Monument to Modernist Vision

Located at 1635 Woods Dr, West Hollywood, CA 90069, USA, the Stahl House (Case Study #22) is an epitome of modernity and Japanese minimalism. A collaboration between Clarence and Carlotta Stahl, who had the vision for the home, and architect Pierre Koenig, this house has been recognized as one of LA’s historic cultural monuments. Besides, it is listed as one of the top architectural structures in America. Furthermore, its elegant exteriors and iconic Eames Lounge Chair make it a symbol of architectural excellence.

2. The Eames House: Home to Iconic Designs

Situated at 203 Chautauqua Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90272, USA, the Eames House (Case Study #8) is not only a mid-century modern masterpiece but also the birthplace of iconic designs like the Eames Lounge Chair. Designed and built by Charles and Ray Eames in 1949, this home is known for its modernity, Japanese minimalism, and innovative modular construction.

3. The Bass House: A Unique Wood-Clad Gem

Located at 2275 Santa Rosa Ave, Altadena, CA 91001, USA, the Bass House (Case House #20B) stands out as a unique gem among mid-century modern homes in Los Angeles. Designed by Buff, Straub & Hensman in 1958, it deviates from the prevalent steel construction with its distinctive use of wood as the primary building material. To add, this home seamlessly integrates with its natural surroundings, exemplifying the principle of bringing the outside in.

4. The Lovell Health House: A Modernist Pioneer

Designed by Richard Neutra in 1929, the Lovell Health House in Los Feliz predates the mid-century movement but greatly influenced it. With its innovative use of space, interconnected rooms, and strong geometric lines, this home served as a precursor to mid-century modern design principles.

5. The Sheats-Goldstein Residence: An Organic Marvel

Designed by John Lautner in 1963, the Sheats-Goldstein Residence in Beverly Crest seamlessly integrates with its natural surroundings. Also, its concrete roof seems to float above the living spaces. And its distinctive design has been featured in movies and magazines, making it an emblem of architectural innovation.

6. The Kaufmann House: Desert Modernism in Palm Springs

Designed by Richard Neutra in 1946, the Kaufmann House in Palm Springs is a striking example of desert modernism. In addition, its horizontal lines, flat roof, and floor-to-ceiling glass walls blur the lines between the interior and the arid desert landscape.

7. Bailey House: A Mid-Century Family Home

Designed by Richard Neutra in 1947, the Bailey House (Case Study #20), located at 219 Chautauqua Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90272, USA, is an intriguing example of mid-century modern architecture. Further, crafted as a family home that could evolve with its occupants, it features simple rectangular shapes and a captivating curved glass staircase.

8. Case Study #16: A Serene Oasis in Bel Air

Tucked away in the serene hills of Bel Air at 1811 Bel Air Rd, Los Angeles, CA 90077, USA, Case Study #16 is a remarkable creation by Craig Ellwood. As the last surviving member of a trio designed by Ellwood as part of the Case Study program, this house is a city landmark recognized for its innovative design. Moreover, it features oversized translucent floor-to-ceiling glass panels and exposed steel framing.

9. The Schindler House: A Mid-Century Pioneer

Designed by Rudolph M. Schindler in 1921, the Schindler House in West Hollywood set the stage for mid-century modern design principles. As well, its innovative use of space, interconnected rooms, and strong geometric lines paved the way for the mid-century movement.

10. Case Study #21: The Bailey House

Another prominent member of the Case Study House program, the Bailey House (Case Study #21), designed by Pierre Koenig in 1958, exemplifies mid-century modern design principles. Also, perched on a hill in the Laurel Canyon area, this house boasts an open floor plan, sleek steel structure, and walls of glass that invite nature into the living spaces. Additionally, it’s a testament to Koenig’s talent and vision.

Los Angeles’s mid-century modern homes are not just architectural marvels but also cultural touchstones that continue to inspire designers, homeowners, and aficionados worldwide. These homes, with their forward-thinking designs, innovative use of materials, and deep connections to the California landscape, have left an enduring legacy. Also these shape the city’s architectural identity and standing as testaments to the enduring allure of mid-century modernism. Exploring these homes allows us to not only appreciate their aesthetic beauty but also to gain insight into the spirit of innovation and creativity that has defined Los Angeles for decades. Whether you’re a design enthusiast or simply appreciate architectural excellence, these iconic homes are a must-visit to experience the essence of mid-century modern living in Los Angeles.

Check out Minimalist Interior Design: Pros and Cons for more inspirational ideas.

Satin & Slate Logo

Founded in 2017, Satin and Slate is one of the elite interior design studios in Southern California. Located in Long Beach, this dedicated team of designers oversees from kitchen and bathroom renovations to commercial projects. Equipped with their own showroom/studio they can satisfy the needs of any client. Featuring clean lines, bright colors and fresh ideas Satin and Slate’s mission is to bring your vision to life and help transform your space into something extraordinary.

Send us mail

Satin & Slate is an interior design company that is home to some of the best interior designers. Our design studio is located in Long Beach, California. However, we service all major cities throughout Los Angeles and Orange County.

Satin & Slate Interiors 1868 Pacific Ave Long Beach, CA 90806 Call us: (562) 444-8745

Learning Center

This site uses cookies. By continuing to browse the site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies.

Cookie and Privacy Settings

We may request cookies to be set on your device. We use cookies to let us know when you visit our websites, how you interact with us, to enrich your user experience, and to customize your relationship with our website.

Click on the different category headings to find out more. You can also change some of your preferences. Note that blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience on our websites and the services we are able to offer.

These cookies are strictly necessary to provide you with services available through our website and to use some of its features.

Because these cookies are strictly necessary to deliver the website, you cannot refuse them without impacting how our site functions. You can block or delete them by changing your browser settings and force blocking all cookies on this website.

These cookies collect information that is used either in aggregate form to help us understand how our website is being used or how effective our marketing campaigns are, or to help us customize our website and application for you in order to enhance your experience.

If you do not want that we track your visist to our site you can disable tracking in your browser here: Click to enable/disable Google Analytics tracking.

We also use different external services like Google Webfonts, Google Maps and external Video providers. Since these providers may collect personal data like your IP address we allow you to block them here. Please be aware that this might heavily reduce the functionality and appearance of our site. Changes will take effect once you reload the page.

Google Webfont Settings: Click to enable/disable Google Webfonts.

Google Map Settings: Click to enable/disable Google Maps.

Vimeo and Youtube video embeds: Click to enable/disable video embeds.

We improve our products and advertising by using Microsoft Clarity to see how you use our website. By using our site, you agree that we and Microsoft can collect and use this data. Our privacy statement has more details.

You can read about our cookies and privacy settings in detail on our Privacy Policy Page.

• SoCal Wanderer
• Food & Discovery

Must-See Modernist Architecture Destinations in L.A.

• Share on Facebook
• Share on Email
• Share on LinkedIn
• Modernism Week
• Architecture & Design

Every February, architecture fans and interior design enthusiasts travel from all over to descend upon Palm Springs for its annual Modernism Week — which has actually outgrown its name and now spans two weeks in winter and a "Fall Preview" weekend every October.

But you don't have to bear the freeway traffic or brave the crowds in Palm Springs to experience the chicness and sophistication of the Modernist aesthetic. You can find the same kind of world-class mid-century-ism right in Los Angeles — and not just as individual houses standing stoic in their isolation.

In fact, there are clusters of mid-century modernism to behold in L.A. — as well as examples from even earlier in the 20th century, by some of the best forebearers in modern architecture.

Even better, you can view them all year long — even the ones that offer interior tours.

So, if you aspire to be an MCM afficionado — but can't quite bear the thought of making the haul to the low desert — here are six amazing modernist architecture destinations you can visit right now in the L.A. area.

1. Stahl House, Los Angeles

Among all the houses included in the Case Study program that ran from 1945 to 1966, Case Study House #22 (a.k.a. the Stahl House ) is the most accessible to the general public. Located in the Hollywood Hills above Chateau Marmont and just west of Laurel Canyon, the Stahl House is architect Pierre Koenig's entry into the program, which was designed as a kind of experiment in residential architecture — and, in retrospect, represents perhaps the greatest confluence of modernist architects ever.

Each of the Case Study houses that saw completion (and not all did) were considered model homes — exemplary of the type of housing that was possible during the boom that began as WWII soldiers started returning home from the war and the U.S. entered a period of prosperity. Most of them were built in Los Angeles or just outside of it (like in Thousand Oaks), though there was one as far as Phoenix. The Stahl House is one of the most centrally located L.A. ones — and was described upon its completion in 1960 as offering a "happy combination of site, soil, height and location."

Originally built for client C.H. "Buck" Stahl and his wife Carlotta, the 2,300-square-foot house has remained in the Stahl family, which thankfully provides access during afternoon, sunset and evening tours. To experience those uninterrupted vistas yourself — from inside and out, thanks to huge plate glass walls — and marvel at how the house is cantilevered on a sheer cliff, perhaps even reenacting one of the famous Julius Shulman photos of the house and even sitting on the furniture, you can make a reservation online .

Stahl House tours are handicap accessible and may be booked as far out as three months in advance for attendees age 10 and up.

2. Trousdale Estates, Beverly Hills

The Los Angeles area actually has strong ties to the Modernist housing tracts of Palm Springs, thanks to Paul Trousdale — who bought 410 acres of the former Doheny Ranch in present-day Beverly Hills in 1954 to create an exclusive colony of single-story estates by some of the top modern architects of the time. (By then, Trousdale had already created the Tahquitz River Estates development in Palm Springs in 1947.) Its exclusivity and prime location attracted such celebrities as Groucho Marx, Elvis Presley, and Dinah Shore — all of whom famously also resided in midcentury modern homes in Palm Springs.

Today, more than 500 original homes (of at least 3,000 square feet) remain in a single enclave, still known as Trousdale Estates (pronounced "Troosdale") — featuring masterful architectural works by modernists like Paul R. Williams, A. Quincy Jones, Cliff May, Edward Fickett, and more. Author Steven M. Price calls it "a concentration of A-list residential work unmatched anywhere else in the city" in his book "Trousdale Estates: Midcentury to Modern in Beverly Hills." At the time, acquiring a lot and hiring one of those architects to build upon it meant you'd really "made it."

There are two main thoroughfares through Trousdale Estates (with a couple of side streets in between): The main stone gateway to Trousdale Estates is located at North Hillcrest Road at Doheny Road, or you can enter by the Greystone Estate gatehouse at Loma Vista Drive and Doheny Road. It's a beautiful neighborhood for a drive — or a walk, if you can handle the hills and the lack of sidewalks. (Perhaps get a ride to the top and walk downhill, if you're interested in taking your time on foot.) If you're driving, be aware of parking restrictions on Red Flag Warning days — and be sure to turn your wheels towards the curb (to the right downhill, and to the left uphill).

Be respectful of private property, and don't disturb the residents!

3. Balboa Highlands, Granada Hills

Early Spanish missionaries referred to the North San Fernando Valley's rolling hills as "La Encantada Cuestas," or the "Enchanted Hills." Today, we know that North Valley community as Granada Hills — which became a vibrant Los Angeles suburb once the freeways arrived in the mid-20th century. It's also home to the Valley's first post-World War II neighborhood to be designated a historic district: Balboa Highlands, located along Jimeno Avenue, one block west of Balboa Boulevard, as well as Lisette Street and Nanette Street. It became a Historic Preservation Overlay Zone (HPOZ) in 2010.

The creation of developer Joseph Eichler (his only such development in L.A. County), by 1963 it was accessible by no fewer than four freeways — and by 1964, it had given rise to over 100 ranch/contemporary ranch-style homes. Plans by noted modernist architects A. Quincy Jones, Frederick Emmons, and Claude Oakland offered sophistication at a time when mass-produced homes were a bit more cookie-cutter (and boring). It was also the only such housing tract outside of Pacoima with a developer-backed policy of opening it up to all homebuyers regardless of color or religion — in a time when racially intolerant housing practices had continued even after the Supreme Court struck down racial covenants in 1948.

Early Moderns: Five Architectural Highlights in Los Angeles

There are four types of architectural models found in Balboa Highlands: A-frames (designed by Jones & Emmons, Associates), slant-roofed (designed by Oakland, with Jones & Emmons, Associates), and flat-roofed (designed by Oakland). For an additional price, owners could customize their new homes — but they all started out with certain commonalities, like simple façades, a warm, earth-tone color palette (or gray), either a one- or two-car garage (or a covered carport), concrete retaining walls, central atriums, and forced-air heating and air conditioning.

4. Gregory Ain Mar Vista Tract, Mar Vista

The City of Los Angeles adopted its first modern (a.k.a. post-World War II) historic district in 2003: the Gregory Ain Mar Vista Tract, located on the westside of Los Angeles near the borders of Santa Monica, Venice, Marina del Rey, and the Palms neighborhood. Originally subdivided in 1946, this housing tract was designed by Los Angeles-based modernist architect Gregory Ain in collaboration with Joseph Johnson and Alfred Day. Ain — considered a significant "second generation" modernist architect — taught architecture at USC for several years after World War II.

These Post-War homes, constructed in 1947-8, were made possible because of investment from the Fair Housing Administration, a federal program devoted to promoting home ownership and addressing the need for affordable housing as the defense and aircraft industries continued to grow and draw more employees to the area. The concept was to bring good design to those households making only modest incomes — and according to the city's Preservation Plan for the Mar Vista Tract HPOZ, Ain was considered "the first architect to design a house that did not contemplate servants."

Departures Field Guide: Gregory Ain Mar Vista Tract

Out of the 100 parcels that were initially planned on the 60-acre site, only 52 of them were actually developed, where one-story, single-family homes (primarily in the modern Post & Beam style) were built and priced at around $12,000 apiece. Ain originally designed it as a " community in a park " — one that would foster community interaction as interior spaces were opened up and the outdoors were brought inside. They were eventually branded as fancy-sounding "Modernique" homes, whose space was adaptable to changing needs (and perhaps growing families), as sliding partitions could divide up a one-bedroom home into a three-bedroom layout.

The Mar Vista Tract is bordered by Beethoven Street, Palms Boulevard, Marco Place, and Meier Street. You can walk its entirety in under 1 mile (with some backtracking to hit the side streets). The original model house for the housing tract — and the first home to be remodeled upon its historic designation — still stands at 3508 Moore Street.

5. Schindler House, West Hollywood

There are three different Rudolph Schindler-designed structures in the Los Angeles area that you can explore thanks to The MAK Center for Art and Architecture — including the Mackey Apartments in Mid City and the Fitzpatrick-Leland House in Laurel Canyon. But why not start on Kings Road in West Hollywood, where Schindler himself lived and worked for 30 years (until his death)?

Schindler's house and studio (now known simply as the Schindler House and the MAK Center headquarters) was built in 1922 — making it an example of early modern architecture. It was conceived as an experiment in communal living, where two couples (four individuals) were meant to cohabit. Schindler and his wife Pauline initially teamed up with Clyde Chace (who also served as the house's builder) and his wife Marian — but then later lived at the "King's Road House" with Schindler's friend and rival, architect Richard Neutra and his wife Dione.

Like many of the modernist homes that were built in the decades that followed, the single-story, 2,400-square-foot Schindler House seamlessly integrates the inside with the outside, letting plenty of light in, and giving a generous view of the outdoors. To see how "ahead of its time" it really was — some calling it the "birthplace of Southern California modernism" — purchase an advance ticket online for open hours Wednesdays through Sundays (except holidays), 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.

Visit the MAK Center website for scheduled closures for exhibition installations and observed holidays.

6. Neutra VDL House II, Silver Lake

The VDL II Studio & Residences that stands today on Silver Lake Boulevard across from the Silver Lake Reservoir is named the second one because it actually replaced Richard Neutra's circa 1932 original, which burned down in 1963. With the help of Neutra's son Dion, a new-and-improved (and decidedly more "mid-century") version was able to rise from the ashes in 1968.

You can admire its exterior from the sidewalk — but to see the interior's floating stairs to the sky, glass walls, and even a tiny elevator, take one of the 30-minute tours offered by architecture student docents from Cal Poly Pomona, which inherited the house in 1990. You can make an advance reservation for one of the tours, which are offered Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

This article was updated on Feb. 14, 2023 with the most currently available information.

The Future Fulfilled? Modernism's Effect on the California We Know Today

Shock of the New: Los Angeles vs. Modernism

Daniel Dove: Reviving the Ruins of Mid-Century Modernism

Sip, Snack and Stroll Your Way Through Thai Town and East Hollywood (But First, Coffee)

Find Flow, Practice Mindfulness and Engage in Self-Care at These South L.A. Hidden Gems

Get 'Swole' at Babes of Wellness, Plus Other Ways to Nourish Your Mind and Body in Compton

• Eames Foundation

find us on:

Eames House

• Charles and Ray
• Eames House and the CSH program
• Case Study House Bluff
• Photo Gallery
• How to Visit
• Covid-19 Safety Protocols
• Guided Exterior Tour
• Group Guided Exterior Tour
• Interior Tour
• Members Appreciation Day
• Small Wedding
• Specialty Events
• Visitors Submissions
• Memberships
• Corporate Sponsorship
• 250 Year Project

Collections

• On-going Studies
• Conservation Management Plan
• Team Thanks

The Eames House, also known as Case Study House No. 8, is a landmark of mid-20th century modern architecture located in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles. It was designed and constructed in 1949 by husband-and-wife Charles and Ray Eames to serve as their home and studio. They lived in their home until their deaths: Charles in 1978 and Ray, ten years to the day, in 1988.

Charles described the house as unselfconscious . There is a sense of that “way-it-should-be-ness”. Charles and Ray designed a house specifically to meet their needs, but they were those universal needs that we all share as humans. They believed in the honest use of materials and straightforward connections. The details WERE the product!

And then by nestling the house into the hillside, rather than imposing it on the site, they realized their original intent: for the house in nature to serve as a re-orientor. The scent, the sound of birds, the shadow of the trees against the structure whether inside or out, the openness of the site—all the elements join seamlessly.

Charles said, “Just as a good host tries to anticipate the needs of his guest, so a good architect or a designer or a city planner tries to anticipate the needs of those who will live in or use the thing being designed.”

Come visit and explore how the house exemplifies many of the themes of the Eameses’ work: from furniture to exhibitions, the guest/host relationship, the iterative process that leads to meeting the need, the importance of the direct experience, the relation with nature, the life in work and work in life, the importance of details, and more. Together the structure, collections, and landscape tell the story of the couple’s approach to life and work.

The Eames House consists of two glass and steel rectangular boxes: one is a residence; one, a working studio, exploring process, materiality and color.

The Eameses looked at life as being an act of design. The residence is filled with the “stuff” of their living: the stuff that tells the story of their lives, interests and loves.

The Eames House structure and its contents are often the focus of attention, but the landscape is critical to their understanding. As Charles said, “Eventually everything connects”.

Help us share the Eameses’ joy and rigor with future visitors, so they may have a direct experience of Charles and Ray’s approach to life and work.

• All Style Guides

Scandinavian

Mid century modern.

Shabby Chic

5 stunning mid century modern homes in la, up high in the hills of hollywood sit the very best of la's mid-century homes that continue to inspire today..

• Posted on 17th May 2023
• Words By Jackie Grimes
• Tags City Tours Inspiration Mid Century

What’s synonymous with mid century homes? You guessed it, Case Study Houses. A residential experiment designed to inspire new ideas for affordable and efficient housing post-war in America, although most are predominately in Los Angelas. The house was designed by leading architects and designers who were at the helm of the mid-century era . The best part? Well, they’re visually delightful to look at and admire. But they’re also open to the public to take a tour around.

Mid century modern homes in LA

Let’s head over to LA, high in the Hollywood Hills to soak up the best of the city’s mid-century homes that still today are massively sought after.

The Bass House

There is so much to love about the Bass House. It’s open-plan and true to the principle of bringing the outside in with the gigantic tree acting almost like an umbrella over the home. More famously known as Case House #20B, the Bass House was designed by the architectural group, Buff, Straub & Hensman and completed in 1958. Originally built for the industrial and graphic designer Saul Bass, this house is particularly unique as it’s one of the few houses there were built primarily out of wood, rather than steel as much of the other Case Houses were.

2275 Santa Rosa Ave, Altadena, CA 91001, USA

Stahl House

A collaboration between Clarence and Carlotta Stahl who had the vision for the home and architect Pierre Koenig who was brave enough to take it on. Stahl bought the land the house now sits on for $13,000 in 1954 and today, the Stahl House (Case Study #22) has been recognised as one of LA’s historic cultural monuments and is listed as one of the top architectural structures in America. It only takes a glance at its elegant exteriors and even more divine interiors to understand its accolades.

1635 Woods Dr, West Hollywood, CA 90069, USA (Reserve a tour)

Classic Mid Century Home: Eames House

Home to the original Eames Lounge Chair, Case Study #8 was designed and built by Charles and Ray Eames in 1949. Then their home and studio, Eames House is known for its modernity and Japanese minimalism and is an incredible example of modular housing. Intentionally easy to manufacture and assemble, the home is an example of what you build in just 90 hours. Today, the house belongs to Eames Foundation and it is still considered as one of the most important sites of modern architecture. Not to mention being home to some of the most iconic mid-century interiors.

203 Chautauqua Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90272, USA

Bailey House

Intriguing from on the outset, the Bailey House infinitely beautiful. Designed by Richard Neutra in 1947, the Bailey House (Case Study #20) was realised as a family home and was intended to be able to grow with the family that moved into it. The simple rectangular shapes sculpting this home make this a particular mid-century favourite.

219 Chautauqua Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90272, USA

Case Study #16

Tucked away in the hills of Bel Air, the Case Study #16 makes for a serene oasis in the center of LA. Remarkably, this house was one of three Craig Ellwood designed as part of the Case Study program and is the only one left, as the other two homes were heavily remodelled. Recognised as one of the city’s landmarks for its innovative design, #16 offers something architecturally unique with its huge translucent floor-to-ceiling glass panels and exposed steel framing.

1811 Bel Air Rd, Los Angeles, CA 90077, USA

Inspired by LA homes and their exteriors?

Of all the inspiration to take from mid century modern homes in LA and the influential designers behind them, its clear that the exterior of our homes can make all the difference to the overall look and feel. While it’s simple to make changes to the interior of a home to give that nod to one of the most beloved interior styling trends to have ever existed, it’s not the easiest to bring those elements to the exteriors. However, with experts like Ian Abrams Architect at your finger tips, you don’t have to search far and wide to achieve a similar appearance to the stunning homes found throughout LA.

Not ready to leave mid-century modern goodness? Take a city tour around Palm Springs .

Choosing a Statement Headboard 101: Buyer’s Guide

Leaning into inspiration from Soho House, we're talking all about headboard designs and why every bedroom needs one.

New Year, New Home: Top Interior Design Trends for 2024

Some trends come and go but these interior design trends for 2024 are set to last a lifetime. Let's make this year the year your home reflects your taste and appreciation for the finer things in life.

Qettle’s Boiling Water Taps Are Worth It—Here’s Why

After learning about how much I'm paying for the exact amount of energy that's consumed inside my home, boiling water taps seems like a solution to help cut costs in the long run.

To revisit this article, visit My Profile, then View saved stories .

• What Is Cinema?
• Newsletters

Inside L.A.’s Ultimate Mid-century Modern Home

By Mark Rozzo

All featured products are independently selected by our editors. However, when you buy something through our retail links, Vanity Fair may earn an affiliate commission.

In March 1954, Clarence “Buck” Stahl and Carlotta May Gates drove from Los Angeles to Las Vegas and got married in a chapel. They each worked in aviation (Buck in sales, Carlotta as a receptionist), had previous marriages, and were strapping, tall, and extremely good looking—California Apollonians out of central casting. Buck was 41, Carlotta, 24. Back home in L.A., as the newlyweds pondered their future, they became preoccupied with a promontory of land jutting out like the prow of a ship from Woods Drive in the Hollywood Hills, about 125 feet above Sunset Boulevard. It was as conspicuous as it was forbidding, visible from the couple’s house on nearby Hillside Avenue. “This lot was in pure view—every morning, every night,” Carlotta Stahl recalled. Locals called it Pecker Point, presumably because it was a prime makeout venue. For the Stahls, it became the blank screen on which they projected their dreams of a life together, a place to build a future, a family, and a house like no other.

Buck Stahl teaches his infant son Mark how to swim, 1967.

Carlotta with daughter Shari on the lounge chair and Bruce in the pool.

About two months after their dash to Las Vegas, the Stahls decided to drive up to this mystery spot and have a look around. They found themselves gawping at the entirety of Los Angeles spread out below in a grid that went on for an eternity or two. While they stood there, the owner of the lot rolled up. He lived down in La Jolla and rarely came to L.A. In the kismet-filled conversation that followed, Buck agreed to buy the barren one-eighth-acre lot for $13,500, with $100 down and the seller maintaining the mortgage until the Stahls paid it off. A handshake later, the couple owned 1635 Woods Drive. On that site, they would construct Case Study House #22, designed by Pierre Koenig, arguably the most famous of all the houses in the famous Case Study program that Arts & Architecture magazine initiated in 1945. For generations of pilgrims, gawkers, architecture students, and midcentury-modern aficionados, it would be known simply as the Stahl House.

The house in 1960, as captured by Julius Shulman during the day.

Sixty-one years since its completion, the modestly scaled L-shaped dwelling still exemplifies everything that is Californian and modern, a built metaphor in prefabricated steel and glass for Los Angeles itself. Yet the Stahl House—which began as a model that Buck fashioned out of beer cans and clay—transcends time and place. Its very image, as the architect Sir Norman Foster once wrote, embodies “the whole spirit of late 20th-century architecture.”

The family’s streamlined kitchen.

You probably know that image, the one Julius Shulman, the architectural photographer, created of the Stahl House in 1960, when the house was barely complete: black and white, twilight, a pair of seated women in conversation, the glass corner of the house cantilevering 10 feet out into nothing except a forever view of glistening, celestial L.A. In 2016, Time Magazine declared it one of the 100 most influential photographs of all time. “If I had to choose one snapshot, one architectural moment, of which I would like to have been the author,” Foster wrote, “this is surely it.” The image continues to hold sway over contemporary practitioners. “That photograph was pivotal in so many peoples’ lives,” the laureled Seattle-based architect Tom Kundig said. “I mean, is there any other photograph that captures in a single image the potential of architecture, the optimism of it? I don’t know if there is.”

Buck and his nephew, Robert, in front of his DIY model of the house.

Carlotta and a family friend (left) with Mark in 1967.

Thanks to a seven-and-a-half-minute exposure, Shulman had managed to capture a serenely futuristic, even utopian, tableau. But the shoot, with plaster dust everywhere and a furniture delivery man taking a detour to visit his mother in Kansas City, was chaos. The backstory of that photograph is one of many spun out in The Stahl House: Case Study House #22 , a sumptuous new book by two of the Stahls’ children, Bruce Stahl and Shari Stahl Gronwald, with the journalist Kim Cross. (Buck and Carlotta, and the youngest Stahl sibling, Mark, are no longer living.) “As kids,” the authors write, “we didn’t know our house was special. It was simply ‘home.’ ” Their book is a startlingly intimate document, chockablock with family snapshots, that goes beyond steel decking, glass walls, concrete caissons, and the geometry of H columns and I beams. It’s a love song to a global icon that was, for the residents themselves, no museum.

Shulman’s famous seven-minute exposure captures the house and its sprawling city backdrop.

As the Stahls tell it, the house may have been a modernist glass bubble, but the glass had smudgy handprints all over it. The towheaded Stahl kids liked to roller-skate across the concrete floors and got up to the usual youthful japery—setting Barbies afire and the like. Jumping off the dramatic, oversailing roof into the swimming pool was an important rite, one eventually passed down to the Stahls’ grandchildren. Buck would shout for the kids to “aim for the drain,” meaning the deep end, and they would take flight, the turquoise water rushing toward them and sky all around. The pool was the center of everything. Shari once rode her tricycle into it, and Bruce developed into a champion swimmer who broke the world record for the 50-meter freestyle. Carlotta, for her part, made delicious treats in a kitchen outfitted with pink GE appliances. Adolf Loos’s dictum “ornament is crime” may have animated Koenig’s minimalist design, but she went to town on a tucked-away powder room: floral wallpaper, shag carpet, framed embroidery, and plastic daisies. Buck was the kind of dad who built the children’s nightstands himself; the Stahls’ decor was no high-end fantasia of Eames, Knoll, and Nelson. Like the prototypical postwar suburban family, the Stahls made do and got by.

Eventually, the Stahl House, like all midcentury houses, fell out of fashion. But in 1989 it was rebuilt, in replica, as the star attraction of the “Blueprints for Modern Living” show at L.A.’s Museum of Contemporary Art, a surreal experience for the Stahls, who strolled through a parallel-universe version of their family home that had been styled as if for a Hollywood production. And then, more and more, real productions began beating a path up to the real Stahl House: movies, television, Vogue shoots. In 1990, the vocal trio Wilson Phillips filmed the video for their hit “Release Me” there, with director Julien Temple evoking Shulman’s famous photograph. For Carnie Wilson, one of the singers, the experience was the apotheosis of all things Los Angeles. “Here we were in a house that overlooked all of L.A., thinking of the Beach Boys and the Mamas and the Papas,” she said, referring to the group’s pop-royalty parentage. “It just felt all encompassing there.” Modernism came back in style and the Stahl House, owned by the Stahl family to this day and open to hundreds of visitors on guided tours every year, became one of the most photographed buildings in the world. The house was even a guest star on The Simpsons. It doesn’t get much more pantheonic than that.

“When I built in steel, what you saw was what you got,” the plain-spoken Koenig once said. What Buck and Carlotta Stahl got when they drove up to Woods Drive in 1954 was more than they ever envisioned. “They simply built their dream home,” their children write. It’s a dream that never ends.

Photos excerpted from The Stahl House: Case Study House #22: The Making of a Modernist Icon by Shari Stahl Gronwald, Bruce Stahl, and Kim Cross, published by Chronicle Chroma 2021.

All products featured on Vanity Fair are independently selected by our editors. However, when you buy something through our retail links, we may earn an affiliate commission.

— A Messy Vaccinated Wedding Season Has Arrived — How Harry and Meghan Decided On the Name Lilibet Diana — Black Joy Comes to Shakespeare in the Park — Even More Kanye West and Irina Shayk Details Emerge — The Bennifer Story Really Does Have Everything — Ahead of the Diana Tribute, Harry and William Are Still Working On Their Relationship — Tommy Dorfman on Rewriting Queer Narratives and the Smell of Good Sweat — From the Archive: A Spin on the Top DJs in the World — Sign up for the “Royal Watch” newsletter to receive all the chatter from Kensington Palace and beyond.

Royal Watch

By signing up you agree to our User Agreement and Privacy Policy & Cookie Statement . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

By Bess Levin

By Susan Page

By Kase Wickman

By Hadley Hall Meares

Midcentury Preservation

Los Angeles, CA

Mid century modern scene: los angeles, california.

While Palm Springs has the highest density of Mid Century Modern homes, Los Angeles managed to draw quite a few of the city’s modern  architects a bit west as well. Use this list as your starting point for your very own Los Angeles Mid Century Modern experience!

Prominent Mid Century Los Angeles Architects:

• Frank Lloyd Wright
• Charles & Henry Greene
• Pieter Koenig
• A. Quincy Jones
• Paul A. Williams

Los Angeles Modern Homes:

• Eames House by Charles & Ray Eames
• Ennis House by Frank Lloyd Wright
• Gamble House by Charles & Henry Greene
• Hollyhock House by Frank Lloyd Wright
• Neutra VDL Studio and Residence by Richard Neutra
• Millard Kaufman House
• Schindler House by Rudolph Schindler
• Stahl House by Pieter Koenig
• Theme Building by Paul A. Williams

Los Angeles Modern Events:  

• LA Conservancy Preservation Awards

Los Angeles Modern Societies:  

• Los Angeles Conservancy

Los Angeles Modern Museums/Exhibitions:  

• Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art
• Los Angeles County Museum of Art
• The Institute of Contemporary Art

Los Angeles Modern Tour Companies:

• Los Angeles Conservancy Tours
• Architecture Tours Los Angeles
• Los Angeles Insider Tours
• Sunset Ranch Hollywood
• AIA Los Angeles

Terms and Conditions - Privacy Policy

Modern Living LA

Modern Living in Distinctive Los Angeles Homes

MODERN LIVING LA

Welcome to Modern Living LA. We strive to create the best and most unique platform for the architecture and design minded. We cover everything from assisting our clients in buying and selling unique homes, to offering some interesting Los Angeles architectural history. If you want to know about design that inspires us, homes we’ve lost or things we’re looking forward to, you’ve come to the right place. We’ve worked provide something of interest for all our like-minded travelers. For your real estate needs, at Modern Living LA we understand you have a choice of agents. So simply put, we are results driven team of experienced agents who put the client first.

THE MODERN LIVING LA GROUP | BUYING

MODERN LIVING in DISTINCTIVE LA HOMES | SELLING

MODERN LIVING LA brings you … LIFE | STYLE … for your Enjoyment & Viewing Pleasure

Please Enjoy, Some of our Favorite Homes … | Curated Just for You …

modernlivingla

Sharing our fine appreciation of exceptional LA homes. Whether Mid Century, Spanish, Architectural or just a place to call home, we’re here to assist.

EXPERIENCE MODERN LIVING LA …

Whether buying or selling, an experienced agent is needed to navigate the current marketplace. Online portals may offer some pretty pictures, but achieving “a win” requires much more. We have a significant online presence combined with sophisticated market knowledge, relationships with other agents, and savvy negotiating skills. This creates a real advantage for our clients.

MLLA has had the pleasure of representing buyers and sellers of many homes designed by significant architects, such as Richard Neutra , John Lautner , Rudolph Schindler , Buff and Hensman , Raphael Soriano and many more. We have a fine appreciation for homes by noted architects and lesser-known names alike. There are many examples of exceptional homes built in and around Los Angeles in many styles over the last century. Whether Spanish, Traditional or Architectural, we are here to assist.

Over $500 Million In Sales | #1 Team | COMPASS Sunset Strip Office Since 2011 Represented Buyers and Sellers of Classic Los Angeles Homes by Noteworthy Architects John Lautner, Richard Neutra, Raphael Soriano, Richard Dorman and More

Named One of the 7 Best Websites for Modernist Real Estate Worldwide by The Spaces

If you would like to know more call  310.622.0312  or email  Brian Courville . Whether  Mid Century Architectural ,  Spanish ,  Luxury , or Classic Los Angeles design, MODERN LIVING LA is here to guide you home. Follow us on Instagram  @modernlivingla

Designated one of the Top 7 real estate websites for modern homes in the world by thespaces.com

• BUYING WITH US
• SEARCH FOR HOMES
• SELL WITH US
• PROPERTY EVALUATION
• SOLD PROPERTIES
• CURATED HOMES
• A. QUINCY JONES
• BUFF AND HENSMAN
• CRAIG ELLWOOD
• EDWARD FICKETT
• GREGORY AIN
• H. HAMILTON HARRIS
• JOHN LAUTNER
• LLOYD WRIGHT
• PAUL WILLIAMS
• PIERRE KOENIG
• RICHARD DORMAN
• RICHARD NEUTRA
• R.M. SCHINDLER
• RAPHAEL SORIANO
• RODNEY WALKER
• WALLACE NEFF
• BEVERLY CENTER | BEVERLY GROVE
• BEVERLY HILLS
• BRENTWOOD | CRESTWOOD HILLS
• HANCOCK PARK
• HOLLYWOOD HILLS EAST
• SHERMAN OAKS
• SILVER LAKE
• STUDIO CITY
• SUNSET STRIP | HOLLYWOOD HILLS WEST
• WEST HOLLYWOOD
• MID CENTURY & ARCHITECTURAL
• LUXURY HOMES | ESTATES
• LIFE | STYLE
• Places We’ve Lost | Then & Now
• Design Inspirations
• Cool in the Community
• Things We Like
• NEIGHBORHOODS
• Beverly Grove | Beverly Center
• Beverly Hills
• Brentwood | Crestwood Hills
• Hancock Park
• Hollywood Hills East
• Sherman Oaks
• Silver Lake
• Studio City
• Sunset Strip | Hollywood Hills West
• West Hollywood
• FEATURED PROPERTIES
• TESTIMONIALS

BRIAN COURVILLE Architectural and Estates Director DRE#: 01496206 | Realtor®

8560 Sunset Boulevard, 3rd Floor West Hollywood CA 90069

[email protected]

310.622.0312

Compass is a real estate broker licensed by the State of California and abides by Equal Housing Opportunity laws. License Number 01991628. All material presented herein is intended for informational purposes only and is compiled from sources deemed reliable but has not been verified. Changes in price, condition, sale or withdrawal may be made without notice. No statement is made as to accuracy of any description. All measurements and square footage are approximate. If your property is currently listed for sale this is not a solicitation. Compass | Modern Living LA, is committed to providing an accessible website. If you have difficulty accessing content, have difficulty viewing a file on the website, or notice any accessibility problems, please contact MLLA to specify the nature of the accessibility issue and any assistive technology you use. MLLA will strive to provide the content you need in the format you require. MLLA welcomes your suggestions and comments about improving ongoing efforts to increase the accessibility of this website. Compass | Modern Living LA, is committed to providing an accessible website. If you have difficulty accessing content, have difficulty viewing a file on the website, or notice any accessibility problems, please contact MLLA to specify the nature of the accessibility issue and any assistive technology you use. MLLA will strive to provide the content you need in the format you require. MLLA welcomes your suggestions and comments about improving ongoing efforts to increase the accessibility of this website.

Copyright © Modern Living LA. All rights reserved.

Cookie banner

We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from. To learn more or opt-out, read our Cookie Policy . Please also read our Privacy Notice and Terms of Use , which became effective December 20, 2019.

By choosing I Accept , you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies.

Share this story

The West Coast's 15 must-see midcentury modern buildings

Design fans have long made pilgrimages up and down the Pacific Coast seeking architectural exemplars of the modernist movement. Now there's a new guidebook just for them.  The Mid-Century Modern Architecture Travel Guide is not only required reading for architecture junkies, it's also a handy tool for stringing together midcentury modern road trips. Author Sam Lubell's evocative descriptions are paired with luscious photos by Darren Bradley (known on Instagram as @ modarchitecture ), and together, they cover all the classics and uncover some hidden gems.

Here are Lubell's picks for 15 must-see West Coast modern sites.

Geisel Library | William Pereira

• Open in Google Maps

Salk Institute | Louis Kahn

Sunnylands | A. Quincy Jones

Wayfarers Chapel | Lloyd Wright

The Stahl House | Pierre Koenig

Old Cathedral of Saint Mary | Pier-Luigi Nervi and Pietro Belluschi

Weston Havens House | Harwell Hamilton Harris

Brubeck House | Beverley Thorne

Marin County Civic Center | Frank Lloyd Wright

Sea Ranch | Moore, Lyndon, Turnbull & Whitaker (MLTW)

Mount Angel Library | Alvar Aalto

Watzek House | John Yeon

St. Joseph Medical Center | Bertrand Goldberg

Rainier Tower | Minoru Yamasaki

University Unitarian Church | Paul Hayden Kirk

Loading comments...

Site search.

• Los Angeles
• San Francisco
• Archive.curbed.com
• For Sale
 in LA
• For Rent in LA
• Curbed Comparisons
• Neighborhoods
• Real Estate Market Reports
• Rental Market Reports
• Homelessness
• Development
 News
• Transportation
• Architecture


Please verify you are a human

Click "I am not a robot" to continue

Reference ID:

1 million Mexican Americans were deported a century ago. A new L.A. audio tour explores this 'hidden' history

O lvera Street, adorned with brightly colored papel picado (perforated paper) and teeming with lively puestos (food stalls), did not always look as vibrant as it does today. While the historic pedestrian street and El Pueblo de Los Angeles Historical Monument attract about 2 million tourists annually, many don’t know how the area came to be or that it was the site of the first public immigration raid in Los Angeles.

A new self-guided audio tour , presented by the California Migration Museum, explores both the origin of this storied area and the “hidden” history of the La Placita raid that ultimately led to the deportation of as many as 1.8 million Mexican Americans across the country in the 1930s.

The immersive experience, titled “Ni de Aquí, Ni de Allá” — meaning neither from here, nor from there — is narrated by Karla Estrada, an activist and advocate for immigrant justice. The founder and director of the museum, Katy Long, contributes to the story’s narration as well. The tour, which is also available as an interactive, 360-degree YouTube video , is part of the museum’s “Migrant Footsteps” series, which offers similar free audio walks in the San Francisco area.

The project took nine months to develop and was funded in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. The museum has four walking tours based in San Francisco; this new tour is the first to trace the rich migration history of L.A..

In an interview with The Times, Long said the museum wanted its first L.A. experience to trace the history of La Placita and Olvera Street because it "made sense on so many levels."

"It is the space where Los Angeles was founded," Long said. "That area has this long, layered history going back to the Native Americans, who were there before the Pobladores arrived, and then you have these layers upon layers of different migration histories that all center and circle around La Placita."

Long said the California Migration Museum has plans to create more tours in L.A. The "short list" of ideas and topics they'd like to explore in future experiences include California's Proposition 187 , the Great Migration and the history of Jewish Los Angeles.

A century ago, the subset of downtown L.A. where La Placita and Olvera Street exist today was home to Mexican, Chinese and Italian immigrants. The plaza became known for “radical political rallies” by the 1920s. Because it was such an active gathering spot, government officials launched a highly visible immigration raid at the plaza in February 1931, Estrada says in the audio tour.

The tour’s narration details how the public became more hostile toward immigrants during the beginning of the Great Depression. In L.A., officials made plans to expel immigrants to create job openings for U.S. citizens, and the La Placita raid was one of the first steps of that effort.

The audio features reenactments of the scene of the 1931 raid, with voice actors depicting police and immigration officials demanding immigration papers from the 400 Mexicans who were enjoying music and food at the plaza that day. Estrada says prior to 1917, there were significantly fewer checks at borders and less restrictions on immigration, so many of the people there did not have documentation.

While only a "few" people were deported as a direct result of the raid, many immigrants were intimidated by the officials and feared deportation following the public scene. After the larger L.A. community criticized the intimidation tactics, Estrada says immigration officials switched their focus to “coercing” the poorest immigrants to voluntarily return to Mexico.

Long asks in the narration, “When you leave because you feel you have no other choice, is that really voluntary?”

Over the next decade following the raid, more than a million people across the country, tens of thousands of whom were children born in the U.S., making them American citizens, were deported to Mexico or left under coercion.

The final stop on the tour is a monument, unveiled in 2012, acknowledging California’s history of Mexican repatriation.

“The State of California apologizes to those individuals that were victims of this ‘repatriation’ program for the fundamental violations of their basic civil liberties and constitutional rights committed during this period of illegal deportation and coerced emigration,” the description on the monument reads.

Long said this chapter of L.A. history has "so many contemporary resonances" with ongoing conversations about immigration to the U.S.

"The story felt like a way to connect with so many questions that are still being asked today about what it means to be Mexican American in the United States today," Long told the The Times. "What does it mean to be a second-generation immigrant? Do you belong, and how contingent is that on having the right paperwork?"

The tour also examines the origin story of what we know as modern-day Olvera Street, including Christine Sterling's efforts to transform the area from a “forgotten” part of town to a treasured cultural site and tourist attraction. Estrada notes in the tour’s narration that Sterling wanted to present a more “colorful” history but that her creation was “far away from the reality of Mexico.”

“This place is an invention, a fantasy,” Estrada says of modern Olvera Street, especially compared with her Mexican hometown of Cuernavaca. “The plaza there does not have colorful stands, nor the Día de los Muertos in July. This place reminds me of the movie ‘Coco.’ Vendors with embroidered shawls and dresses, bright Catrinas and sugar skulls.”

Sterling lobbied L.A. officials and fought for the area’s preservation and development in the 1920s until Olvera Street’s grand opening in April 1930, just a year before the first immigration raid in the area. The tour includes interviews with the owners of Casa California on Olvera Street whose relatives hold Sterling in “high regard” for giving their family the opportunity to escape poverty decades ago. Her portrait is framed at the entrance of their shop.

Despite her contributions to Olvera Street, the narrator acknowledges Sterling’s complicated relationship with Mexican Americans, saying she had a “white savior complex” and calling her “patronizing and autocratic.” Much of the criticism of Sterling comes from her effort to obscure a 1932 mural by David Alfaro Siqueiros, titled “América Tropical,” that depicted a country “oppressed and destroyed by imperialism.”

By the end of the 1930s, the mural was entirely whitewashed and would not be seen by the public again until 2012, after a years-long conservation effort by the Getty .

“Ni de Aquí, Ni de Allá” incorporates the origins of Olvera Street and its status as a cultural attraction into the larger conversation of the history and current state of Mexican immigration to the U.S. Estrada notes that “eating tacos or dancing in the street can’t erase the dark reality that many Mexican immigrants live in fear of deportation.”

One of Estrada’s final remarks on the tour speaks to that effort to bridge this untold story with our present: “Unless we remember our history, we will be condemned to repeat it.”

This story originally appeared in Los Angeles Times .

Thousands of L.A. city employees to get pay raises after City Council approves deal

LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Thousands of Los Angeles city employees will be getting a boost in their paychecks.

On Wednesday, the City Council gave final approval on raises totaling 22% over five years.

Contracts have already been ratified by unions representing the workers.

Minimum wage for city workers will go up to $20 per hour starting this year, with a goal of $25 per hour by 2026.

Also approved were improvements to parental leave, increasing paid time off to 12 weeks.

Related Topics

• LOS ANGELES
• LOS ANGELES COUNTY
• LOS ANGELES CITY COUNCIL
• UNION CONTRACT
• MINIMUM WAGE

Top Stories

Massive police presence responds to South L.A. after officers injured

Woman found dead in trash bin in Sunland identified

Man dies after setting himself on fire outside NYC courthouse

Teens critically injured in Van Nuys crash that sent vehicle flying

San Francisco sues Oakland to stop it from changing name of airport

California's free preschool hasn't solved challenges around child care

• 2 hours ago

Man gets 11 years in prison for DUI crash that killed 3 in Placentia

House votes for possible TikTok ban in US

Movie lovers, a new TCM Classic Films Tour is rolling at the Warner Bros. Studio backlot

Call it a fresh way to time travel: the lot look-around will include deep peeks at the golden age of hollywood., by alysia gray painter • published april 19, 2024 • updated on april 19, 2024 at 5:13 pm, what to know.

• TCM Classic Films Tour at Warner Bros. Studio
• The new tour celebrates the 30th anniversary of Turner Classic Movies with lot stops spotlighting treasures of Hollywood's Golden Age
• Tickets start at $95; find yours on the Warner Bros. Studio Tour Hollywood site

Time travel machines, at least in the movies, often boast blinking knobs and glowing wheels and the truth is this: You're never sure where they'll take you, once they're off and flying.

But what if you could board an open-air vehicle that also services as a time-traveling device, the sort of airy auto that takes you to stops and spots where some of Tinseltown's titans once worked, created, dreamed, and occasionally lived?

Such a wondrous mode of transportation exists, and you won't need to pass through a silver screen to reach it: It's located at Warner Bros. Studio, where the brand-new TCM Classic Films Tour is now on the movie-loving move.

Get Southern California news, weather forecasts and entertainment stories to your inbox. Sign up for NBC LA newsletters.

The tour was unveiled just ahead of the TCM Classic Film Festival , which is shimmering in Hollywood through April 21.

Launched to honor the 30th anniversary of Turner Classic Movies, the tour is putting "a focus on the studio's early days, delving into the timeless allure of classic cinema and feeling the magic of Hollywood’s rich history firsthand."

Television will also receive its due, as well as the many films that famously found their first footing at the Burbank studio.

The Eastwood Scoring Stage, which will celebrate its centennial in just five years, is on the tour, as is a look at the exterior of an apartment that James Dean once lived in, a nearby abode he could retreat to while putting in the hours on a film shoot.

‘Crime and Justice' is the theme for TCM's Classic Film Festival; get passes now

Street Food Cinema's new season is in the pink with a colorful ‘Barbie' kick-off

And a rose garden isn't just about the flowers but also love, in the tennis sense: A court once stood there, and none other than Jack Warner, one of the studio's founders, enjoyed some time at the net.

The Property House — the name reveals the structure's purpose — will also be visited, and prop mavens will get to check out artifacts seen in some of the cinema and television's best-known works.

"For 100 years, Warner Bros. has stood for the very best in moviemaking and TCM has continued to spotlight the legacy of the studio with incredible program offerings throughout its 30 years," shared Mike De Luca and Pam Abdy. 

"We are thrilled movie lovers from around the world can visit the iconic Burbank lot to experience the TCM Classic Films Tour and celebrate the rich history of the studio's contributions to cinema."

The tour begins with a welcome video from the TCM hosts; look also for historical snapshots, iconic costumes — including outfits seen in "The Music Man," a beloved musical that is synonymous with the lot's charming Midwest Street — and other treats for those who regularly revisit some of the starriest cinematic offerings of the past.

Tickets start at $95 and are available on the Warner Bros. Studio Tour site.

This article tagged under:

Find anything you save across the site in your account

Step Inside a Midcentury Los Angeles Home That’s Steeped in Family History

By Vaishnavi Nayel Talawadekar

Photography by Haris Kenjar

Growing up in Los Angeles, Meghan Eisenberg was a regular at her grandparents’ home. “We’d gather there for birthdays and holidays and family occasions, where we’d spend evenings dancing on the raised shag platform in the living room,” recalls the interior designer , who also has “distinct memories of delivering devilish tightrope performances on the platform’s wooden beams.”

Today, Eisenberg runs a flourishing namesake interior design firm based in LA. But for the decorator—who is now married and with two kids of her own—the home was special in more ways than one. After all, it had been lovingly designed by her grandfather (midcentury architect Donald G. Park) in 1950 while he was still a student at the USC School of Architecture. “He built it with the help of my great-grandfather, who was a carpenter, with the hope of accommodating his young family: my grandmother, Mary Ann, and their two kids—my mom and uncle.”

Though Eisenberg’s grandmother passed away while she was in college, her grandfather continued to work as an architect and lived in the home until the day he died in 2020. “Before his passing, I was able to work alongside him on a book that chronicled his major works around Los Angeles,” she shares. “So it was my utmost privilege to be able to acquire the house and give it a second life as a prized family heirloom.”

But for a home so steeped in nostalgia, the prospect of a remodel was emotionally fraught for Eisenberg. “I come from a family of designers, architects, and creatives, including my mother and sister, who are also very talented interior designers. Since this house holds so many memories, the worry was that I would change it too much for people’s comfort. However, everyone played their part in keeping me in line, which, while at times challenging, led me to find the right balance between making it my own and honoring the past.”

Using her grandfather’s architecture as the guiding light, Eisenberg rooted her design decisions in the home’s existing details. The terracotta tiles in the dining room and foyer, for instance, were restored to their former glory, while vertical tambour paneling—originally limited to one small area of the house—was extended into the dining room and kitchen. Likewise, the wood-paneled walls of the family room were preserved, save for one sun-damaged section, which received new walnut panels left to “age” outdoors for a month. Of course, what she couldn’t save, she substituted with additions that her grandfather would likely have approved of, such as Luis Barragán–inspired plain sawn hardwood flooring, trucked in to replace the wall-to-wall carpets.

As for the decor, Eisenberg opted for a midcentury ranch-house style in a bid to dial up the color and pattern. “Since my mom grew up in this house as a flower child of the ’60s, I leaned into the floral motifs and paisleys and just adapted them to give off a more bohemian vibe. I also embraced the corduroys, velvets, plaids, and ginghams that I love so much.”

Most evenings, Eisenberg finds herself playing DJ to her kids—Agnes, 4, and Roman, 2—on her childhood dance stage (the raised shag platform installed by her grandfather). “I almost got rid of it,” she remembers. “So many people who visited early on in the remodel encouraged me to remove it in order to have more space, but I didn’t necessarily need more space. I ended up keeping it only for its sentimental value.” In hindsight, she declares it her best decision yet—proof enough that her grandfather continues to be her biggest collaborator, and she his biggest disciple.

The home’s entrance features a cozy sit-out with Loma Chairs by Hollywood at Home. The facade is painted a shade of Nostalgia by Portola Paints & Glazes . The front door wears a lick of Farrow & Ball’s Deep Reddish Brown .

The living room is a treasure trove of time-served gems. The vintage Heywood Wakefield Lounge Chair was sourced via Vintage on Point , while the Dan John Anderson side table is from The Future Perfect . The midcentury sofa, which dates back to her grandparents’ ownership of the home, was updated by Eisenberg with a skirt in 36 Bourne Street’s Burnley Overdye Ticking in olive/black , purchased via Nickey Kehoe. Likewise, the ottomans, originally her grandfather’s, were reupholstered in Designs of the Time’s Milma fabric . The Early Barcelona Coffee Table is an original by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe .

When Eisenberg began the remodel, her grandfather’s six-seater dining table was hardly enough to accommodate the huge family dinner parties she and her husband customarily hosted. “I was looking through some old drawings—the house was remodeled in 1955, 1965, and 1985—when I noticed one early rendition included a dining banquette just off the kitchen,” says Eisenberg, who took it as a sign to bring it back. Today, the dining table can accommodate up to twelve people. It is complemented by Charlotte Perriand Rush chairs from Amsterdam Modern and a vintage 1950s Maison Lunel floor lamp by Hollywood at Home.

The kitchen nods to the outdoors with earthy tones and burnished finishes. The cabinets and tambour panels wear respective coats of Graceland and Gaspar by Portola Paints & Glazes. For the cabinet hardware, Eisenberg chose Colonial Bronze finishes from Liz’s Antique Hardware. The French Wood Tripod Stool was purchased via Panoplie , and the vintage German reading sconce via Lumfardo . The unlacquered polished brass faucet and Calacatta Capria backsplash were respectively sourced from Waterstone and Stoneland.

By David Sokol

By Sarah Archer

By Chelsea Hodson

The breakfast nook is a happy family production. The vintage Knoll dining chairs, reupholstered in a Robert Kime Karsamba weave , belonged to Eisenberg’s grandfather. The custom pendant was designed by Eisenberg herself, while the artwork was created by her daughter, Agnes. The few non-family additions include a Spindler Round Dining Table from CB2 and a Lake Blue Catch All by Victoria Morris Pottery .

The family room is a rust-toned oasis, dominated by a Turkish Sofa by George Smith and a pair of Nickey Kehoe Round Hassock ottomans . A vintage Hans Wegner coffee table, also from Nickey Kehoe, takes center stage. The lithograph is an original by Joan Miró, and the drapery is tailored from Rose Uniacke linen. An antique English cricket table from Jefferson West masquerades as the side table.

The primary bedroom is a tranquil sanctuary that plays hide-and-seek with the morning sun. The furniture scheme is composed of a Pacific Bed by Jenni Kayne , a custom nightstand, and a short French Light Wood Tripod Stool from Panoplie . For the walls and windows, respectively, Eisenberg opted for a Phillip Jeffries Seagrass Grasscloth 1978 wallpaper and Aryan Chota fabric shades from Namay Samay . The 1960s Turkish area rug was picked up at Jamal’s, and the Oval Lamp in Atlantic Blue from Victoria Morris Pottery .

“Originally, there was one very small vanity inside the primary bathroom and that wasn’t going to cut it for my husband, who insisted that ‘you’re not living until you have a double vanity,’” laughs Eisenberg, who, in a bid to retain the original interior footprint, decided to relocate the bath vanity to inside the bedroom. “I took extra care to make the vanity feel original to the architecture by creating a high picture rail that runs around the room and across the top of the vanity. I then added grasscloth to everything below it, including the vanity alcove.”

The primary bathroom is a verdant antidote to LA’s year-round sunshine. Forest-toned Heath ceramic tiles cloak the floor and walls and match the cabinetry, which sports a shade of Homage by Portola Paints & Glazes . For the fixtures, Eisenberg elected to use Waterworks’s Ludlow range in unlacquered brass and unlacquered bronze hardware by Colonial Bronze —the latter sourced from Liz’s Antique Hardware.

The poolside area channels a laid-back vibe thanks to the choice of pared-back furniture—the Tulum Lounge Chair from West Elm and the Pacifica Double Chaise by Serena & Lily , a classic case in point. Eisenberg sourced the vintage Italian Rattan Stool by Tito Agnoli via Panoplie . As for the picnic table, it was a treasure inherited from her grandfather.

By Sam Cochran

By Kristen Flanagan

By John Wogan

By Mayer Rus

Classic film lovers: See James Dean’s apartment and more on new TCM tour at Warner Bros.

• Show more sharing options
• Copy Link URL Copied!

In 2021, the Warner Bros. Studio Tour created new interactive exhibits focused on the company’s recent history, unveiling areas dedicated to the DC Comics universe and the “Harry Potter” franchise.

This week, the popular Studio Tour in Burbank is doubling down on its more distant past.

Warner Bros. is now offering a Turner Classic Movies-branded version of its studio tour that will bring guests to previously off-limit areas of the lot, including vintage animation buildings, a mini rose garden and an apartment that once housed James Dean. The 90-minute tram portion of the jaunt — about 30 minutes longer than the studio’s standard tram excursion — will allow guides to go deeper into the history of the studio’s catalog to deliver factoids related to such films as “Casablanca,” “My Fair Lady,” “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Auntie Mame” and many more.

“We’re off the leash,” says Brad Taylor, a 15-year tour guide veteran with Warner Bros., noting that the TCM excursion will include time for guides to chat with visitors about their favorite films.

“We get to talk to the guests and really hang out with people who have the same passion that we do,” Taylor says. “I find that ‘classics’ guests are less about behind-the-scenes and more, ‘I can’t believe this is where we are.’ It’s just the look on their faces when they realize ‘Casablanca’ filmed here, or James Dean stood right here.”

The launch of the TCM tour arrives during the network’s 30th anniversary and close to 12 months after classic film fans were given a scare. In June, Warner Bros. announced that layoffs would hit TCM, including some of the network’s top executives, prompting concern from prestige directors such as Steven Spielberg, Paul Thomas Anderson and Martin Scorsese. After garnering national attention, key cuts were reversed and Warner Bros. sought to assure fans that TCM would continue to be handled with care.

Long live TCM! Our culture would be worse off without movies on TV

Without Turner Classic Movies and other channels for movies on TV, we’d lose the instructive pleasures of the happy accident, the unexpected discovery.

Aug. 1, 2023

TCM network hosts — Eddie Muller, Jacqueline Stewart, Ben Mankiewicz, Alicia Malone and Dave Karger — recorded new video segments for the outing. The tour will take guests into the lot’s Property House, an area not visited by the standard tour. Here, visitors can get glimpses of materials for a full set, including items for a complete Oval Office setting, but expect guides to highlight vintage items, such as a throne from the Errol Flynn pirate film “Captain Blood.”

Danny Kahn, vice president-general manager of the studio tour, says there have been numerous requests over the years from guests to delve a little deeper into the studio’s animation history. That’s why the TCM tour will for the first time take visitors to an area of the lot once known as “Termite Terrace,” which from 1955 to 1964, says Taylor, housed the animation department, a building with a sloped roof designed to capture sunlight. Animation legend Chuck Jones, says Kahn, had an office in the Termite Terrace area in the 1990s despite Warner’s moving animation production elsewhere.

Entertainment & Arts

How the Universal Studios tram tour defined the modern theme park

The most important theme park ride ever created? It may just be the Universal Studios tram tour, which dates to the silent film era. Once primarily a behind-the-scenes tour, the trek has evolved to define the modern theme park.

Aug. 3, 2023

Another unique tour locale is the exterior of the Dean apartment. When Dean resided there during filming of “East of Eden,” it was actually across the street from the lot, the apartment nesting above a pharmacy. But gradual studio expansion has led to the area now being on Warner Bros. property.

“That was an actual drugstore with apartments, and the studio rented it for him,” Kahn says. “I think it was to keep an eye on him and keep him on a short leash.”

The tour will also give tram riders a look at executive life at the studio, allowing them to briefly walk around a rose garden. The manicured spaces once held a tennis court as well as offices and personal screening rooms for the likes of studio mogul Jack Warner, with many of the structures dating to the 1920s. “It’s a really historic area of the lot that hasn’t really changed a lot in all these years,” says Kahn, noting the area is still in use by studio principals. “Jack Warner, when he ran the studio, privatized the first floor. That was a massage parlor that he had beneath his office.”

TCM Classic Films Tour

Where: The Warner Bros. Studio, 3400 Warner Blvd., Burbank 91505

When: Most days, 8:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m.

Cost: $95 for adults; $82 for children. A SoCal resident discount is available for $75

Info: (818) 977-8687 or wbstudiotour.com

Staples of the tour, such as a journey around the backlot city streets, a visit to the “Friends” set and cafe and recent additions highlighting the studio’s modern franchise films are included in the TCM trek, as is a pre-tour reception with beverages and pastries. All told, expect the tour to last about 3½ hours. A tour spokesperson says the first TCM-branded outing is scheduled for Wednesday, with trams expected to depart daily after that date. Adult tickets are $95, but there is a Southern California resident discount available for $75.

“It feels so good to have TCM here,” Kahn says. “People understand that the TCM brand is synonymous with classic film.”

More to Read

Jason Reitman and a group of directors have bought Westwood’s iconic Village Theater

Feb. 21, 2024

Tom Cruise teams with Warner Bros. in a deal to make new movies

Jan. 9, 2024

TMZ’s new ‘selfie’ tour of Hollywood isn’t just for Gen Z

Nov. 16, 2023

Sign up for The Wild

We’ll help you find the best places to hike, bike and run, as well as the perfect silent spots for meditation and yoga.

You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.

Todd Martens joined the Los Angeles Times in 2007 and covers a mix of interactive entertainment (video games) and pop music. Previously, Martens reported on the music business for Billboard Magazine. He has contributed to numerous books, including “The Big Lebowski: An Illustrated, Annotated History of the Greatest Cult Film of All Time.” He continues to torture himself by rooting for the Chicago Cubs and, while he likes dogs, he is more of a cat person.

More From the Los Angeles Times

Travel & Experiences

This must be Topanga Canyon

April 19, 2024

You don’t ‘hike’ Fiery Furnace, Utah’s exclusive maze of slot canyons. You get lost in it

April 18, 2024

L.A. artist Blxst on his Coachella debut and where he’s eating Weekend 2

Camille Claudel’s hand, not her trauma, is at the center of a magnificent Getty Museum show

April 17, 2024