Kathleen Reges, 50; Fostered Art Scene in Downtown L.A.

Kathleen “Kathy” Reges, who helped her estranged husband, Richard Carlson, develop the Brewery in downtown Los Angeles as an art colony, has died. She was 50.

Reges died Thursday at County-USC Medical Center of a heart attack, according to her companion, environmental designer Leonard Pate. He said she was hospitalized for treatment of multiple injuries resulting in cardiovascular trauma after a fall at her home at the Brewery complex.

Reges, known as an art collector and patron, also had a national reputation as a breeder of champion wire fox terriers at Kathrich Kennels, which she founded 23 years ago.

Reges’ home was designed by Michael Rotondi, whose Roto Architects Inc. moved into the Brewery in 1991. Reges, long a fan of architecture and of Rotondi’s work, and Carlson commissioned him to create an abstract but livable home from their aged industrial building.

The resulting futuristic house, a focal point of the Brewery’s 20 acres at 2020 N. Main St., has been featured in Sunset magazine. It won an American Institute of Architects award.

“A new structure practically independent of the old building was inserted into the building shell,” Sunset described the three-bedroom house.

“Layers of the new house float off this framework: rooms, stairwells, decks and catwalks move in, out, around and through the old structure. This organizational layering lets you experience the building and the views from lots of different levels and vantage points.

“Great planes of steel were treated like folded paper; every surface tucks behind another, each an opportunity to let in light and edit views,” the magazine continued.

After Reges and Carlson separated, while remaining business partners, Reges continued to live in the house.

“This house is a diagram of her life,” Pate said Saturday. “It has her kennel, her gallery and her living and entertaining spaces.”

Reges frequently organized fundraising dinners and other events for the Fellows of Contemporary Art and similar groups supporting artists.

The Brewery, now a popular destination for gallery hopping as well as a living and working complex for artists, was the site of beer-making operations from 1880 until 1979.

When Pabst Blue Ribbon closed the facility because of dwindling demand and outdated equipment, Carlson, along with his father, Arnold, and brother Steven, bought it.

After the city passed a law in 1981 allowing artists to live in industrial zones, Carlson and Reges began developing the property as artists’ lofts and studios.

Reges quickly became a kind of den mother to the artists who moved into the more than 250 spaces, helping them show and sell their work to art lovers she encouraged to visit.

“She not only supported artists, she also knew how to inspire them,” Pate said. “She had an innate sense of putting people together who would never have met otherwise, often forming creative and lifelong bonds. This might be her true legacy.”

Born and brought up in Potomac, Md., Reges received a degree in art history from Columbia University’s Barnard College.

In addition to Pate, Reges is survived by her mother and stepfather, Olympia and Andrea Condon, and two brothers, Greg and Mark Reges.

Services in Potomac, Md., are being planned.