Staggering and Heartbreaking

As an unprecedented series of wildfires fueled by Santa Ana winds consumed thousands of homes and tens of thousands of acres in Greater Los Angeles, we turned to documenting the mid‐century modern homes impacted by the devastation.

The toll and the accompanying stories, from the eastern San Gabriel Valley all the way to the Pacific Ocean, were heart‐wrenching, to say the least.

While firefighters worked 'round the clock, beginning January 7, to beat back the flames, the smoke cleared only to reveal the still‐smoldering ashes of residents' homes and communities.

"It's staggering and heartbreaking—I don't know any other way to put it," said Ken Bernstein, principal city planner at the Los Angeles City Planning's Office of Historic Resources, in a recent interview with the Seattle Times. "This is widespread destruction of significant architecture and places that are cherished in our communities."

On January 12, the death toll had reached 24 (yet would continue to climb), and one of the two main fires, the Palisades Fire, had burned more than 23,700 acres, whipping through Malibu, Pacific Palisades, Brentwood, and beyond.

In Los Angeles' world of modern architecture, one of the most devastating losses was architect Ray Kappe's 1990 Keeler House, a magnificent cantilevered post‐and‐beam residence tucked into the Palisades. Designed for jazz singer Anne Keeler, the home was featured by the Eichler Network in our profile of the architect, 'Playing with Space.'

Also lost in the Palisades Fire were the Freedman House by architect Richard Neutra and the Robert Bridges House by Robert Bridges.

The fate of Los Angeles' beloved Eames House (Case Study House No. 8), Charles and Ray Eames' 1949 masterwork in the Palisades remained precarious.

Eames Demetrios, the Eames' grandson, reported that "at this moment, it is safe…[and] we were lucky," he said January 12 via Facebook. "It means a lot to me, our family, and the whole Eames community that so many people care."

In the San Fernando Valley, the 1963‐'64 Balboa Highlands Eichler tract in Granada Hills was threatened by two separate fires, the Hurst Fire and the Archer Fire.

There, photographer and Eichler homeowner John Eng captured an ominous late‐night scene on January 7 showing an Eichler home still decorated for the holidays, with a hillside of threatening flames looming in the background. Powerful winds made it a close call.

"In my 30 years of living here, these are the strongest winds I can ever recall," Eng remarked. "The main window at the rear of our house was rattling, threatening to shatter at any second.

"From our living room, we could see flashes from arcing power lines or transformers at the nearby power station. Minutes after that, flames erupted in the hills about a mile from our homes."

On the street above, fellow Eichler owners David and Yuki Edminster also watched through walls of glass that framed the fires.

"With over 50 mile‐per‐hour gusts, our house shook, and its original Eichler glass windows kept visibly bowing for hours," said David. "I truly thought the largest window in the living room wouldn't survive the night."

Sharing updates with neighbors in person, through texts, and the community's Facebook group, "some [Balboa Highlands'] neighbors evacuated, and some decided to stay a little longer," he added. "We wanted to protect our houses as long as we could…in case the embers jumped to the neighborhood. It was a scary night, to say the least."