A 'New' Modernist Landmark - Page 2

"So, unlike most kids, I knew the people with whom he was doing work and what he was doing," he said of growing up with a father who was on the cover of Time magazine when Raymond was age 10.

"Most of his 300 designs were done there. Most of his 12 books were written there," the junior Neutra said of the house at 2300 Silver Lake Blvd.

Meanwhile, Richard Neutra's associates and proteges were working with him in his home studio, including Rafael Soriano, Donald Wexler, Harwell Harris, and Gregory Ain. Additionally, the local pharmacist in the Silver Lake neighborhood had a brother-in-law who took some photographs of the house in 1936. When the architect saw them, Raymond said, "He said, 'Get this young guy to come see me.'"

"That was the beginning of Julius' career," he added of Julius Shulman, premier photographer of mid-century modern architecture.

This career eventually included "pictures of my dad picking through the charred ruins in that part of the house," the son recalled of a 1963 fire that demolished the entire main house except the basement.

"One of the reasons that this was such an interesting place is that it was built in three different times," said Raymond, referring to the addition of a garden house in 1940, and then a rebuild in 1964 designed by his father and Dion Neutra, Raymond's brother.

"If the Neutra house had not been designated as a national landmark before President Obama left office, it would have been necessary to restart the nomination process with the new Secretary of the Interior..." notes a press release issued January 12 by Cal Poly Pomona, where Neutra taught classes. The university's non-profit foundation has owned the property, and its College of Environmental Design has managed it, since it was donated to the school in 1990 by Richard's widow, Dione.

And so it is that Sarah Lorenzen is the third architecture professor to live at the home and, at some point, to head a university design department.

"The principal thing this does is raise the visibility of the house…[and] opportunities for fundraising," she said of landmark designation, adding that it may include a plaque ceremony in March. "Richard is really the person who did the big push for getting the landmark status."

"The case I made was that this was the place he [Richard] used to demonstrate his ideas," Raymond Neutra said of writing the landmark application, which followed seven years after the property was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The main house is home to a rotation of architecture exhibits coordinated by Lorenzen and is available for touring on Saturdays.

"He [Richard] tried to accommodate what people do, how they socialize," said Raymond, retired director of environmental health for California Department of Health Services. "The Eichler homes very much continue in that tradition. It's great that people are appreciating those houses now."