Home: Letters to the editor
Reading your Lost L.A. column on Frank Lloyd Wright’s La Miniatura in Pasadena (“Want to Buy La Miniatura? Take Note,” Sept. 4) brought back a flood of memories from my high school days in 1969. My best friend, Nicki, lived there with her grandfather, an industrialist from another era. Nicki and I spent many hours at La Miniatura hanging out as young teenage girls.
I’d walk up the drive past the old Rolls-Royce, and the elderly and elegant butler would come to the door to announce my arrival. Of course, we had to dress for dinner. Most memorable were the life-size antique dolls in the living room that always gave me the creeps. In the morning after a sleepover, we would have strawberries and cream — served by her butler — while looking over the lily pond. We stayed in the studio near the dog cemetery and did plenty of partying there.
What was marvelous about the house was the mix of spectacular architecture and the Old World energy brought by the people who lived there. I was a lower-middle-class girl from Pasadena, oblivious at the time to how special this magical home was.
One day I was telling my designer husband about the home, and he was shocked to learn that I was a knuckleheaded teenager hanging out in a masterpiece and had no clue. Older and wiser now, I am saddened to think that it would be bought, disassembled and moved out of Pasadena. It’s like a little piece of my childhood slipping away. ?
Susan Hollywood Papalia
La Crescenta
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The article suggests two things about the Millard House (La Miniatura), designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and built in 1923. First, that some fool will move it, quite possibly to Japan, where, apparently, shrewd taste, money and engineering acumen still abound. Second, that the house is in terrible shape; it’s small, it’s crumbling, it’s cramped — no room for the flat screen, the wine bar, the massive fridge.
The first statement is true, the second is not.
The Millard — 4,230 square feet on an acre of land, very cramped indeed — is actually in fine shape. The “textile blocks” didn’t incorporate the destructive rebar that Wright’s other three textile block houses did. The Millard is also in fine shape because its current owner had the resources to equal Wright’s passion in restoring it. When I visited the house long ago, it was dark, gloomy and claustrophobic, with wet tarps draping the interior walls and roof. The experience confirmed everything I loathed, physiologically and intellectually, about Wright and what I then believed was a kind of arrogant authoritarianism, both in the hubris of using the surrounding soil material in the blocks and in the architectural vision he tried to force me to submit to.
But here, after a multimillion dollar restoration over an 11-year period, the house astounds me as a piece of spatial DNA, conferring so many remarkable opportunities in three dimensions that I now understand what Wright needed to achieve for his client. It’s sunny and open but solid; refuge and treehouse; majesty and then informality. Even walking along the concrete canopy from house to the studio makes the heart quicken because that space, so serene and beautiful, promises that whatever work is to hand will be done more richly. It’s why virtually every visitor’s conversation I’ve overheard includes something about coveting that space.
Sam Watters’ piece really begs the question, what makes “great architecture” so great? La Miniatura is exceptional because it knits together not only textile blocks but also other larger relationships, beginning with the site.
Sure, someone could move it, even if there is hardly another example of a deeper symbiosis between a house and a setting, a hidden oak ravine in Pasadena as diminutively scaled as La Miniatura itself. The house and the site are irrevocably intertwined, the design tracing the changes in the topography like a lover. The weaving of earth and dwelling, the knitting of body with nature, indoor with outdoor, of sheltered, intimate space with soaring, liberated space — a lot of difficult issues have been resolved. Of course, there’s a cost to maintain a thoroughbred. But in contrast to owning, say, a two-dimensional Picasso for $100 million, La Miniatura offers the opportunity to experience one’s humanity in ways most houses and their architects have never even conceptualized. One could buy more space, but would it feel alive?
Besides, maybe the massive fridge isn’t necessary. Despite its seclusion, the Millard is in the middle of Pasadena, a stone’s throw from freeways and near, even walkable, to all kinds of stores from Super King to Whole Foods. After all, you know it’s the law here to burn calories.
Barbara Lamprecht
Pasadena
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We all know that any Hollywood A-lister (James Cameron, Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie …) could buy this house, fund its restoration and maintenance, and hardly miss the pocket change. If any of these people had a sliver of gratitude to the town that’s afforded them so much success, they’d rescue this gem and then open it for public tours. Just think of the generations of children who could be inspired by Wright’s work here in SoCal.
Donald C. Bryan
Pasadena
Think ‘restore,’ not ‘buy cheaply’
As one who cringes at the thought of using furniture that is anything other than well-crafted, even in a “guest room or home office,” I was quite pleased when I saw that you offset the article on budget sofas [“6 for Under $600,” Sept. 11] with a sidebar titled “Renew a Vintage Piece.” Yes, I know we are in a recession and cheap is a popular story. My husband and I have an armchair that was his mother’s. Before that, it lived in her parent’s home. It has a lot of family history, not to mention style and comfort. It will cost us a pretty penny to recover and restuff, but it deserves to be. I may even be able to reuse the beautiful fringe that wraps around the base.
K.T. Waltzer
Pacific Palisades
Fish photo shows poor judgment
After looking at the front page of the Home section (“Bali West,” Aug. 21) several times, I was just as repulsed as when I first saw it.
My concern isn’t for the fish being held by the boy (as cruel as that may sound). No, my concern is broader. Your circulation has taken severe hits over the last 10 years. Technology, demography and culture aren’t within your control. But editorial content is 100% your responsibility, and what a colossal blunder this morning.
Showing this photo — so prominent and tough to overlook — can only drive readers (the few of us left) away. I love the paper. Please use better judgment. You still may have time to read the PETA letters you may get.
Bill Boyd
La Cañada Flintridge
Mentioning nudists was TMI
I liked the article on creative trading of home spaces (“My House for Your Swim Lessons,” Aug. 14). However, I didn’t understand why you would end with something so ominous as a houseful of unexpected nudists. I understand the journalistic upside-downside convention, but that seemed to undermine the whole article; it was out of proportion. It felt lazy to me, and, frankly, I would rather have just heard more about creative trades going on.
Megan Hobza
Whittier
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