Architect Corner - Rudolph Schindler
Rudolph Michael Schindler (September 10, 1887 - August 22, 1953) was an Austrian-born American architect whose most important works were built in or near Los Angeles during the early to mid-twentieth century.
Schindler’s career is nicely summarized here, including the time that he worked for Frank Lloyd Wright.
Wright was able to hire Schindler after obtaining the commission for the Impereial Hotel in Tokyo, a major project that would keep the architect in Japan for several years. Schindler's role was to continue Wright's American operations in his absence, working out of Wright's Oak Park studio in Chicago. It was Wright who got Schindler to come to Los Angeles in 1920 to work on the Barnsdall House.
I am excited to catalog my Schindler architecture images in this post. A special post pertaining to the Schinder projects managed by the MAK Center can be found here.
Below, in chronological order, the Schindler residential projects that I’ve visited in the LA area:
854 N La Jolla Rd. West Hollywood, 1925
This one is located just a couple blocks from the iconic Schindler House (aka Kings Road House). Though it had caught my eye when I explored the neighborhood and I took a photo, it was not till years later that I discovered that Schindler was the architect.
Lovell Beach House. Newport Beach, 1926
Condensed from the Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) Archipedia:
Lovell Beach House was designed for a client who was part of a circle expounding and practicing progressive ideas and ideals on health, education, and culture in Southern California. Dr. Philip Lovell was a naturopath, with a clinic promoting healthy physical living and a column, “Care of the Body,” in the Los Angeles Times that espoused his ideas. Schindler and Lovell were connected through a progressive group centered on Barnsdall. Lovell viewed his life as a public advertisement for his ideas and work and, to design his vacation house, found an architect whose vision was as radical as his own.
The site for the house was a small corner lot on a boardwalk that ran along the beachfront on the Balboa Peninsula in the seaside city of Newport Beach in Orange County. The house is sited in the northwest corner of the lot, covering about half of the site area, with the main floor of the house elevated a story above the street and beach level. While Schindler generally sited his houses to define a privatized outdoor space, in this case, with the oceanfront site he created an open space in front of the house facing the beach. The ground floor contains a garage opening to the alley in the back, and what Schindler called a playground—a sand area under the living space that extends out towards the beach.
The house exhibits one of Schindler’s experimental uses of reinforced concrete, in which he tried out new methods of construction aimed at minimizing costs. In the Lovell Beach House, he designed five parallel concrete frames, poured upright, to support the structure. To save labor and material costs, the formwork used for the first frame was re-used for each of the other four. Wood joists run perpendicular to the frames. The very light, two-inch thick walls are constructed of metal lath covered in plaster and are hung from the concrete frames, with the edge of the living room balcony hung by steel rods attached to the frame above; windows are also hung from the concrete frame.
Architect Richard Neutra designed the landscape plan for the house. Schindler and Neutra had known each other while in school in Vienna and Neutra’s family had joined the Schindler family at their house and studio at Kings Road in Southern California early in 1925; Schindler gave the landscape design of several of his projects in the next few years to Neutra, to help his practice get started in America.
Grokowsky House, South Pasadena, 1928
Fun fact: seven of Dunn-Edwards Then, Now, & Forever® paint colors were derived from colors original to the Schindler-Grokowsky home and represent the colors authentic to International and Modern style architecture.
Revival Red was found ion the home's exterior, along with Suffragette Yellow, and the maple brown sugar tone is named for the architect himself, Schindler Brown.
The home’s interior color palette consisted of Santa Fe Sunshine, Hollywood Starlet, Bakelite Yellow, and Sonoma Chardonnay, a hue which was also traced to the Fuller Paint catalog (1909-1928) and the General Paint catalog of 1930.
Sachs Apartments, 1811 Edgecliff Dr. and 1830 Lucile Ave.,1929
Manola Court (aka the Sachs Apartments) is a sixteen-unit apartment property on a street-to-street downward sloping lot in the Silver Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles. Schindler’s client for the Manola Court project was his friend Herman Sachs, a Romanian-born muralist and decorator known for his work on the Bullocks Wilshire Building, Union Station, and City Hall.
Designated a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument, you can experience it through short-term stays. See @manolacourt
Bubeshko Apartments, 2036-2046 Griffith Park Blvd (1938-1941)
In the late 1930s, Schindler designed two apartment buildings in Silver Lake for Anastasia Bubeshko and her daughter Luby. Per @laconservancy website: “This rare example of multi-family housing by Schindler remained in the Bubeshko family, and home to Luby, for sixty-five years.
The apartments served as a gathering place for artists; sculptor Gordon Newell created the decorative caps on the garage walls of one of the buildings, and architect Gregory Ain was once a tenant.”
In the mid-2000s, the property sold to a young family who sensitively restored the buildings. This project earned a Conservancy Preservation Award in 2010.
Rodriguez House, 1845 Niodara Dr., Glendale (1941)
The Rodriquez House is designated local Glendale Historic Landmark #24. First some exterior images:
Then some of the interior:
I read in my trusty guidebook by Sam Lubell:
Built for composer Jose Rodriguez, it’s sited to maximize direct sun in winter and minimize it in summer. Its L-shaped form carves out a beautiful backyard, to which most rooms have direct access. A long stucco and stone-clad bar fronts the structure, from which projects a large second-floor balcony, facing outsized windows and exposed structural elements.
Goodwin House, Studio City (1941)
It was lovely to spend time in Schindler’s Goodwin House (1941) in Studio City at the MAK Center’s 2024 tour day.
Description from @makcenter: Originally designed for Samuel and Yolanda Goodwin, the Goodwin House is tucked into the hills of Studio City. Retaining its original built-in couches, bookshelves, and cabinets, the Goodwin House exemplifies Schindler’s interest in designing furniture that functions as a part of the architecture “until it is impossible to tell where the house ends and the furniture begins,” as stated in his article “A Theory of Interior Design.”
Roth House, 3624 Buena Park Dr., Studio City (1945)
The porch at the curve of the road is a major exterior feature. From the side, you can view the garage door beneath that porch. When I visited, the owner happened to be home and we had a nice conversation.
Tischler House, 175 Greenfield Ave.,1949
Condensed from the Los Angeles Conservancy : website:
Tischler and his wife Beatrice commissioned Schindler to design a house for their steep hillside lot, and the architect responded with an unusual, almost sculptural building that steps up the slope in levels.
The house’s primary elevation resembles the bow of a ship thrusting forward through the trees, extending the angle of the roof’s gable with a glass and stucco, irregularly shaped, somewhat cruciform volume placed on the front. The steeply pitched roof is sheathed in panels of blue corrugated fiberglass to give the interior a tent-like feel. The material originally heated the interior spaces and cast a blue light, so the owner partially sheathed the interior in plywood to remedy Schindler's experiment.
The Tischler House is an excellent example of Schindler's late work, completed three years before the architect's death. Unpredictable angles and vertical emphasis make it stand out from its conventional residential neighborhood.
Laurelwood Apartments, 11833 Laurelwood Dr., Studio City, 1949
Per the Los Angeles Conservancy website:
Completed in 1949, the Laurelwood Apartments were the last apartments designed by master architect R. M. Schindler. The International Style complex contains twenty two-bedroom units on a narrow lot, but thanks to Schindler’s design each one feels like a private house, with its own entrance, unique views, and private outdoor space. First-floor units have private patios, while each second-floor unit has a terrace on the roof of the next unit down.
Related posts - Architecture Fieldtrip - MAK Center for Art and Architecture, 3 Works by R.M. Schindler