Pop Tops

Nearly lost in Southern California’s sea of color-coordinated tract homes are the often whimsical creations of early 20th century builders who dotted the region with ersatz Persian palaces, turreted medieval castles, Spanish haciendas and French chateaus. Sometimes they topped those homes with elaborate shingled roofs that seemed drawn from the pages of “Hansel and Gretel.”

The custom roofs were durable enough to outlast the 20- or 30-year guarantees of standard roofs, but those homeowners have only two choices when their masterpiece goes bad: replace the roof with something functional (and, usually, far less interesting) or call Steven Fuller.

Fuller, 44, is Los Angeles’ premier, perhaps only, fantasy roof specialist, a conclusion based on Fuller’s claim that no one has ever bid against him for a job. We found him clinging to a roof on busy Highland Avenue, where he was creating another of his authentic period masterpieces. With the deft touch of a Disney imagineer, Fuller took composition shingles (which, except for use on historically designated houses, have replaced wood because of fire concerns) and nailed them into swirling, multilayered patterns. He often hand-carves those stacks of shingles into figures or designs. He uses no drawings or plans, making each roof a unique work of art.

In addition to individually cut and beveled shingles, Fuller often adds surprises into his housetop compositions: copper sheeting, bits of ceramic tile, gemstones, leaping dolphins, even an occasional ceramic squirrel peering discreetly under a rolled eave. Because he weaves those eccentricities into the roof texture, they’re practically invisible to all except the most diligent observer. Fuller says one Beverly Hills client gave him a bonus after discovering, belatedly, an embedded heart designed into the roof above the front door.

Fuller, a high school dropout and son of a former Hell’s Angel, says his closest exposure to art was his father’s tattoos. After a stint in the Navy, he helped a neighbor on a roofing assignment and then took off on his own. One of his first composition projects was to replace the custom roof on an early Bixby family house in Long Beach. He found it so much more interesting than standard roofing jobs that he decided to specialize. He roamed L.A. streets, looking for 1920s and ‘30s neighborhoods, then knocked on the doors of houses whose sculpted roofs needed work. Commissions rolled in, and Fuller never looked back.

It’s hard to compare Fuller’s prices to those of more standard roofing specialists, because a custom roof takes more time and can require as much as five times the amount of material as a standard roof. Fuller described a recent $21,000 job that took him nine weeks to finish. For a similar-sized house nearby, Fuller says another roofer charged $16,000 for a job that took a week to finish.

Working mostly alone at a craftsman’s pace, he has completed 39 houses in the past 20 years. With the large investment of time and with few contenders to his lost art, Fuller figures he will complete perhaps 30 more commissions in his lifetime.

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Steven Fuller’s Favorite Rooftop Inserts and Carved-Shingle Improvisations

Totem pole, Teardrop, Kelp, Moon, Stars, Seagull, Heart, Fish, Starfish, Bird, Feather

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Steven Fuller can be reached through his Web site, www.roofart.com, or at (800) 971-7860.