Irish Stew : Starbuck House Borrows From Other Places, but Feeling Is Pure Emerald Isle
Multiculturalism may be gaining a tentative toehold among both visionaries and apologists, but the armies of political correctness are going to need a lot more arrows in their quivers if they expect to budge the Southern California custom home builder. Even a cursory peek at some of the more massive custom palaces in these parts reveals a Eurocentrism as dogged and chauvinistic as it is gaudy.
Tudor mansions stand cheek-by-jowl with French chateaux, which butt up against Italian villas, which overlook gingerbready rock piles from Mittel Europa. A stroll down a single palm-lined street in Beverly Hills can make you dizzy with culture shock. Where the hell are you, anyway?
Still, amid all the relentless homage to the continent that brought us French civility, English food, Italian trains, German bands and Swiss stand-up comedy, there is not a single example of the residential architecture of the Irish.
That’s what I thought, anyway, until I heard about Sally and Thom Breslin’s house in Fullerton. In a county that can be as architecturally diverse as Daly City, the Breslin home is a beacon of understated nonconformity.
Completed in 1927, the place is known as the Starbuck House and is designated Fullerton City Historical Landmark No. 2. It was built for Raymond Starbuck, an early Fullerton druggist and funeral director who operated Fullerton’s first library and telephone exchange out of his store, the Greater Gem Pharmacy.
The style of the house may be hard to place at first, especially for those who think every house in Ireland looks like John Wayne’s thatched cottage in “The Quiet Man.” Most Irish country houses actually are roofed in shale and are far less basic and squatty than the Duke’s runty place. If they are surrounded by any land at all, they can have a more manorial look, with sharply peaked roofs, recessed windows and inviting round lines to the plaster walls.
So does the Starbuck house. It sits on a quarter-acre of land, which allows a fine, pastoral setback from the street, and the fact that the front lawn rolls with little hummocks and hollows adds to the impression that the house is somehow separate from the others on the block.
The interior suggests either that people were smaller in 1927 or that builder, A.O. Thompson, wanted the Irish authenticity to extend even to proportion. Like many Irish houses, the doorways are thinner and shorter than most in America, and some of the ceilings appear lower.
The walls are a characteristically bright white plaster, but the woodwork--built-in bookcases, doors and trim--are dark, rugged and unpolished. Adding to the rustic look is the hardware, including wrought-iron hinges, door latches and light fixtures, which were made by Fullerton’s first blacksmith.
Every Irish home has a fireplace, and the one in the living room of the Starbuck House is particularly prominent: The hearth is oversized and lined with cobblestones and the hood is made from hand-hammered copper.
The house is larger than it looks from the ground floor. With the exception of the living room, the rooms are mostly small, cozy and light-filled, and no space is wasted.
The dining room is octagonal, however, which gives the feeling of more space. The study is the only room on the first floor that is carpeted (in green), and the leather furniture and the hunting prints there lends to the country squire look.
The upstairs, which was added about 15 years ago, is very much in keeping with the style of the rest of the house.
However, the thick white carpet on the stairs and all floors, and the lighter woodwork and bright colors used in the furnishings make for a refined appearance one might find in a Dublin Georgian row house rather than in a country home.
The bathrooms are determinedly antique: ball-and-claw bathtubs, pedestal sinks and old-fashioned tank toilets (pull the chain).
Sally Breslin said she and her husband bought many of their furnishings specifically for the house, and they appear to have chosen wisely.
Most of the pieces are either antiques or reproductions from the Winterthur Museum Collection of the DuPont estate.
If that hardly seems Irish, then you’ll want to have a look at the Swedish etched window in the study and the street lamp from Budapest in the front yard. About as Irish as Chairman Mao, but they work.
And you can actually get a look at it. The Starbuck House is one of four homes featured on today’s North Orange County YWCA Home and Garden Tour, which begins at 11 a.m. The cost is $20. Information is available at (714) 871-4488.
Actually, you might--might--be able to buy the place yourself someday. Sally Breslin, a real estate agent, said that she and her husband have considered selling from time to time, and she even tested the waters by putting the place on the market recently.
Be warned, however: there was a bit of a markup. The house, which was built originally for $3,500, was listed for $625,000.
Take heart, though. Your basic Portofino villa (by way of Newport Beach) costs a lot more.
