Rancho Deluxe : Rooted in California’s Rustic Past, This Style of Furniture Has a Bright Future in the Collectibles Market
When baby boomers were kids, a well-decorated, middle-class ranch house in Southern California wasn’t complete without a touch of the Wild West: a wagon-wheel sofa or maybe bunk beds with cowboy-and-Indian-patterned spreads.
This faux cowboy chic has long been considered kitsch. But now collectors and historians are re-evaluating the style and--hold on to your hat, Roy Rogers--ranking a few California Rancho pieces with Craftsman collectibles. The rustically romantic style began with the furniture for the adobe ranchos of the area’s earliest Spanish and Mexican settlers. Then, in 1915, a Spanish Colonial architectural theme was selected for the Panama-California International Exposition in San Diego. Fueled by an infatuation with the Hollywood Western as well as the need to furnish thousands of newly built Craftsman and Spanish bungalows, the style flourished.
Barker Bros. introduced California Rancho furniture in 1929. The designer, George Mason, created the 120-piece Monterey line based on a photo of a settee from the movie “Old Arizona,” plus a few inspirational visits to the California missions. This furniture, produced until the early ‘40s, is recognizable--and highly collectible today--because early pieces were branded just like cattle.
Other furniture lines followed: Coronado by Angelus Furniture Co. (Barker Bros.’ biggest rival), Montecito, Forest, Ranch-o and La Fiesta. All the furniture was sturdy, with roughed-up finishes to make pieces appear as though they had been dragged overland. Some pieces were hand-painted and sported rope seats and wrought-iron straps; many were branded or stenciled with designs including horseshoes and palm trees. In 1988, the style gained legitimacy with the Santa Monica Heritage Museum exhibition “Monterey: California Rancho Furniture, Pottery and Art.”
For a generation seeking both comfort and a sense of tradition, California Rancho fills not only a nostalgic void: The furniture bears aesthetic similarities to now-out-of-reach Craftsman pieces, and prices are rock bottom in comparison--say, $2,500 to $5,000 for a Monterey cabinet versus the $363,000 Barbra Streisand paid for a Stickley sideboard in 1988. To appreciate California Rancho, however, one must accept that it’s not a pure vision but a hybrid form. Fans such as collector Robert Smith don’t mind. “If cowboys had had furniture,” he says, “this is what it would have looked like.”
Cowboy Chic
The island of cactus in the front yard of this unassuming 1947 tract house is a hint: A superb collection of California Rancho lies within. Since their childhoods, both Paul and Nancy Aguilar--he’s an electrician and she’s a nurse--have collected Western memorabilia, and after moving into this Whittier house seven years ago, they have continued to add to their bounty.
Quaint and colorful, the Aguilars’ many collectibles are reminders of the rugged frontier: Paul’s hats (a Mexican sombrero, a Tom Mix Stetson and two old, children’s cowboy hats) rest easy but ready for action on the armoire in the living room. A variety of playthings--complete sets of Johnny West dolls and Legends of the West dolls, a toy guitar, a Davy Crockett tray and a toy fort with Cavalry-men figures--decorate the solarium.
Elsewhere, videotapes of vintage cowboy movies, including “The Big Sombrero,” starring Gene Autry, and “Lights of Old Santa Fe,” featuring Roy Rogers, line the shelves. A collection of William S. Hart books and an assortment of dogeared 1930s and ‘40s magazines such as “Old Arizona Highway,” “The Homes of the West” and “Deserts” continue the Western theme.
“I grew up in an era when everything was Western,” says Paul, whose favorite TV shows were “Wagon Train” and “Rawhide.” “On the weekend, my family would go for a ride and picnic at Will Rogers’ ranch. I remember running around and falling in love with it. Here I am, 30 years later, with the same kind of furniture.”
Rustic Renaissance Before Joel Shukovsky and Diane English, the Emmy-winning executive producers of “Murphy Brown,” moved into their early California Rancho Revival house six years ago, it was decorated with avocado-green and harvest-gold carpeting and unappealing grass-cloth wallpaper. What sold the couple and ended their long real estate search (they had looked at 75 houses) were the fabulous “bones” of the 1963 structure and its secluded location in the Santa Monica Mountains. “I’m not a fan of big houses. I like houses that are sympathetic to the land,” says Shukovsky of the rancho, which was built low to the ground and retains its dark, earthy adobe color. “Whitewashing would have been too interruptive,” he explains.
Although Shukovsky and English initially decorated the house with modern Italian and Bauhaus-style furniture, they began buying Mexican and Western-style accessories. They were first attracted to Craftsman pieces, then shifted to Monterey furniture because of its regional character and appropriateness for the house.
“It was not my style at first,” English acknowledges. “I’m much more a fan of a neoclassic or eclectic-country look, but the more the house began to evolve into an early California feeling, the more I began to warm up to it.”
The house is now full of classic examples of trademark horseshoe-branded Monterey furniture and serious California plein-air artwork such as Edgar Payne’s “Desert Clouds,” which hangs over the fireplace. The handsome landscape paintings are a polished counterpoint to the rustic furnishings--a sophisticated marriage of Old California and the West.
Rancho Roundup Robert Smith, a professor of art at Cal State Northridge, and Tobi Smith, director of the Santa Monica Heritage Museum, originally intended to fill their pedigree Craftsman house (designed in 1909 by Myron Hunt of Huntington Library and Rose Bowl fame) with furniture from the Craftsman period. That is, until celebrity collectors such as Steven Spielberg and Barbra Streisand entered the market and pushed prices beyond reach. As Robert writes in the Santa Monica Heritage Museum’s catalogue: “Many of the people now buying Monterey might have purchased Roycroft and Stickley had the price stayed within their budgets. There are a lot of people interested in buying old furniture that fits in Mediterranean- and Craftsman-style houses. When Mission furniture left this eager market, the market found Monterey.”
Though cost was a consideration, the Smiths found they actually preferred the look of California Rancho furniture to that of Craftsman for their Ojai home. The hand-hewn furniture, with its painted flowers and antique finish, better suited the Western presence of their Craftsman interior, and it blended well with the beams and front door, which had been painted in an Indian motif by La Jolla architects Frank Mead and Richard Requa.
The Smiths bought their first Monterey pieces at the Old California Store in Ventura; they also discovered La Fiesta furniture, perfect for the informality of their enclosed sun porch. “It’s a cheap substitute for Monterey,” Robert explains. Where Monterey pieces were painted by Mexican artisans and branded with a horseshoe, La Fiesta furniture was merely stenciled and stamped with a wagon drawn by a donkey.
Where to Find the California Rancho Look Betty Gold, who opened Territory four years ago, combines Old California and Western artifacts and plein-air paintings in a gallery-like setting; more than 100 20th-Century wool and cotton American Indian trading blankets line the shelves. Territory, 6907 1/2 Melrose Ave.
Vicki Berkofsky’s Hemisphere features handmade rugs, textiles, jewelry and furniture. She spent the last 2 1/2 years developing Monterey reproductions with six new crackle-paint finishes. The sofa runs $3,450; the armchair, $2,200. Hemisphere, 1426 Montana Ave., Santa Monica.
Linda and Don Berman’s Raffia offers Western memorabilia and furniture (California Rancho and Pinecraft) and signed, limited-edition L.D. Burke mirrors with cowboy inscriptions ($800 to $1,600). Raffia, 10250 Santa Monica Blvd., Century City.
Gene Autry Western Heritage Museum stocks Thomas Molesworth reproductions--pine desk with leather top ($2,500) and “Gunfighter” armchair ($875)--plus a ‘50s hand-tooled-leather chair (with bullet holes, $560). Gene Autry Museum, 4700 Zoo Drive .
Don Short and Dolores Fisher’s Old California Store doubles as showroom and home. Surrounded by California Rancho furniture and accessories (Mexican color lithographs from the ‘30s, ‘40s and ‘50s; Mexican tourist kitsch and California plein-air paintings; Bauer, Catalina and Pacific tile and pottery; wrought-iron lamps, chandeliers and sconces), the two are credited with rekindling the Rancho style. They also publish a newsletter and arrange field trips to such shrines as Will Rogers’ ranch and the Adamson beach house. Old California Store, 1528 E. Thompson Blvd., Ventura.
