Extraordinary Co-Housing Duplex in Los Angeles - Schindler House 1922 by Rudolph Schindler

Hi everybody, welcome to Arky Marathon. We're at the Schindler House in Los Angeles, also known as Kings Road Residence. Amazing study of a duplex in the 1920s, or as I like to call it, Party House Volume 2. Check out this episode. Oh, roll intro. It's kind of a bit muddy. You roll. I roll my eyes. You do that all the time. Oh hi, come on in. Mind your head. It's really low. I am not a tall person. I am just below six foot and I'm constantly ducking in here. You can already tell, can't you, the Japanese influence? Yep. So he was, and his family, they were Austrian, right? Did they go to Japan at some stage? No, I don't think so. Right. Just the influence of Japanese architecture into the West. Frank Lloyd Wright, yeah. That's part of the reason why Rudolf Schindler's family and Richard Neutra's family, they moved to the United States to work for Frank Lloyd Wright. Oh, two of them? Two of Japanese, yeah. They both lived here. So look, to explain it simplistically, these are two houses. There's one house on that side with a living space that's basically the same proportions, and then this house. So Schindler and his family lived on that side. Schindler worked in a space not unlike this, over that side, around a courtyard. And this particular house has a different orientation. It actually faces out to the east. That's Rick, by the way. Very generous. Rick from Two Gooding. Check out the link below. He's showing us all around LA. It's amazing. And so you've got these two families that are sort of coexisting, separate, but they've actually got a shared kitchen on one side. It's really low because they used to sit on the floor. What? Yeah, very Japanese. What that would... And most of the published images are pretty low. So yeah, it's only the scale and everything makes sense. Yeah, the fire's actually on the ground. Yeah. The engineer's side of the house, which has a garden facing west, and one of these amazing outdoor fireplaces. You can see the big screen there that slides away as well. Unfortunately, they're closed at the moment. So this mix of concrete and the timber, the very Japanese use of timber. But what's really interesting about this, if you look over at this side, is that it's one of the first examples of tilt-up concrete. Yeah, 1920s, this part of Hollywood, they were just farmland. So you can see the construction photos of it just being poured on site and tilted up. Oh, so it was literally poured there? Poured on site, yeah. And they just had the panels, and then you can see they just filled in the gaps to make the slits of glass. Oh, right. What does that look like inside? Watch your head, Kev. By the way, that's the outdoor sleeping pavilion up top. What? That? Yep. It's the climate you can actually sleep outside. Well, Rick was telling us before that there's only, what, like a two-week winter here. So I guess you've got the perfect climate for it. Yep. So this is the threshold of that house. But you do have the shared kitchen. Oh, that's a nice kitchen. Look how high it is. Yeah. It's so strange that everything's low, but this is higher than... Is this higher than 900? It feels like that. Yeah. Yeah, pretty simple. There's not... I don't know. So it's a co-housing model, really, way ahead of its time. Or is it actually going back in time, because co-housing was common? Something about this, you know, rustic, I guess, is the word, but it feels like a Japanese house from hundreds of years ago, in many ways. Even though they're using newer technology of, you know, concrete, cement, and tilt-up, there is something ageous about it. This space is actually the living space of the Schindler side of the house. That's the tilt-up we were just looking at a moment ago. And Kev, you just mentioned... So this is just poured in between, is it? Yeah, it looks like it, doesn't it? I mean, it's just glass. It's a lovely type of light. Yeah, and again, just keep forgetting this is 1922. Yeah. Look at their conduits. Look at this. Oh, actually, this is a better example. Look at the conduit. You've got... They've just put these beams through where they're running services, so there's lights and things like that clipped on here. Well, originally, they had the pencil... What? ...that went on top of this, and they can slide the light along here wherever they need it. That's great. So it's this idea of the flexible living. This is really just an open space, and they can sit anywhere they like. There are some pieces of furniture, I guess, but there's not really that. This reminds me of the... Boyd House? Boyd House, Wall Street. Now, check out that episode where we had a very similar example. But that was a 60s house. But that fireplace outside, which is the back of the other house, really, because the services, you can see it's actually double width. So the other side of that in plan, you can see, is the fireplace for the inside. Oh, okay. So you're saying that's the fireplace... Yep, on this side. ...and this fireplace there. Which is for inside. Yeah, that's inside. That's for outside, for this dwelling. So what it really does is that it suddenly pulled the living space out into the garden. Yeah. The inside-outside relationship that many people talk about is achieved here, because those were meant to open. Which, that was Schindler's studio. Yeah. So right at the end of the house, in a beautiful glass box, and he could slide that open and you could just have a party. Yeah, it wasn't just a yard. So suddenly the fireplace gives it a sort of anchor to the outside. This is facing west. So you've got the sliding doors from the living space, sliding doors from the studio, coming out here, the anchor point that Kev mentioned. But then you've got this beautiful tree and all of the bamboo that actually adds shading to it as well, including a deep eave on this side. So it's quite sort of protected, even though it's taking a lot of afternoon sun. The tilt-up's interesting too, Kev, because it's actually thicker at the bottom than it is at the top. So you're using less material where you don't need it. Yeah, makes sense. The other thing that I noticed, and you noticed, we don't have an answer for, is these sliders are actually tilting. Yeah, I was wondering why they were tilting. Why are they tilting, internet? Can you guys leave a comment and tell us why that's happening? Well, it's not to get rid of water, because we've got a huge eave. Why is that happening? I don't know. Is it part of the tilting language? Don't know. Oh, just using that as a language. It does look wonderfully strange, doesn't it? You can tell that they're angled. Yeah. Let's look through this way. There's a cool bathroom. Cool. All this translucent light is very Japanese, isn't it? Yeah. Well, so this is actually the front door of the Schindler side of the house. So we came originally from the front door of the engineer's family's house. It is interesting, like you said, where it's a subdued, it's very low and subdued filtered light, except for this bit, which is clear. So you get this reference back out into the garden. But then when you go through into the living space or the studio space, you get much more light. Just like, welcome to my house, chill out. And now we're going to hang out and party. On the floor. Well, they did have furniture. These were the Schindler designed chairs. Look at how low that is. Yeah, well, I guess if you're sitting up, you're still engaging with people when you're sitting on the floor, I guess. Yeah, and look, the cabinetry is all sort of cut around. You were saying this was typically fabric? Well, they had fabric draped over it. Is it like that one? Bit like that, but often not as stiff looking. So it's like a counterweight. Oh, it's actually stitched in, right. That looks comfortable. And so this was his studio, so you can imagine him drawing away lots of sunlight, even light out there. With the compression release, there's taller space, even though it's not really tall. No, it feels about it. Yeah, and then you've got all the extra light coming in from above. This is gorgeous. And then looking out and people can be out there having a whiskey next to the fire and you're drawing away. Look, what fun. The bathroom. Oh, yes. One bathroom for each house. Look at the size of it. It is tiny. Look at how rational the plumbing is. It's just the plumbing comes straight through, pick a tap, any tap, and it either throws water that way or water this way. Beautiful light. Look at the beam sitting through that gap. And also, of course, the skylight. Look at this. Oh, and the light's on that side. Right. Oh, that's gorgeous. Yeah. So that's south, so that's northern light. That's just consistent, yeah, soft light coming in there. And the same here, bouncing off that wall onto your face in the mirror. It's quite good. You're not going to climb in the bathtub with you again? Well, I wanted to, but I thought I'd show respect because they did say don't touch anything. But you want me in that bath, I can tell. We're really looking at it as a series of courtyards dividing up two different houses. The interesting thing is each house has like these tilt-up concrete walls that really feels like the back end of the house that reorients in another direction. So the same thing happens on this Schindler side as well. The concrete is back on that side, turning its back to the garden. It's a protection. Yeah. So it gives it an orientation even though they're shared homes. The other thing is like it's incredible how lightweight this structure is. Can you see the lean on that? Nope, not on the camera. Really? Let's try. This whole thing is just doing that. Oh, yeah. And so it's incredibly lightweight structure, paper-thin roof. You could imagine it's a nightmare to try and maintain this. Like this is over 100 years old. Yeah, it's amazing it's still here. Yeah, and you've just got all of this timber that's just exposed to the weather. The original caulking too, it's really hard. It's not like the modern caulking that has give. And the way they dealt with the corners as well. Oh, the mitre. Yeah. Oh, and actually running the... So where the glazing sits in, they just run that around as well. Which again becomes a problem. Yeah. In terms of just collecting water in there. I like how the separation of elements are pronounced. The vertical, the fireplace is this thing. The wall, which is the defensive walls. And they don't quite touch. That's a different element. And then you've got this timber element coming through. And a roof element coming through differently again. It's beautifully articulated and composed. Yeah. On the inside too, it's the magic number. There's actually a little concrete bench down there. So when you're sitting next to the fireplace, you can actually perch in that window. And so this is the eastern side. So that also gets this lovely splash of light. Awesome. Wow. Another great thing about this project is the use of vegetation as screening. So they've all got their outdoor spaces. But the use of hedges, the use of the grass and other things and different ponds. They really do have a sense of privacy. But it's actually part of the architecture. It's not something you throw in afterwards. It's actually part of the design in the way that spaces are defined. Yeah. And sometimes the way to define a space is not necessarily a built solution. Yes. Sometimes the built solution gets in the way of the spatial formation. There's something lovely and loose about that, isn't there? It's still a design decision. Yeah. And again, that layering I talked about earlier. Look, the hedge actually sticks out past it as well. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Amazing. It's a beautiful entry how you slide up the side of the block. And it presents this strong masonry building. But then it starts to soften. And once you enter and you get close to the front door, you're presented with this beautiful Japanese-like screen. So it becomes really tactile and soft and humane when you get close to the front door. That's almost like the Machiya Japanese Kyoto houses too. There's a little ledge there. Yeah. I can't figure that out. That's some sort of... Do you guys know? Storage? It looks like they've changed it up. It's just to get it out of the wets. But it feels like somewhere you need to take your shoes off. Take your shoes off, yeah. Put that in there and then go inside. I assume this is original because it's great. It's this little gun barrel out to the backyard or into the fire. And you can see the fire from in here. Come and have a seat, guys. Come on. This is pretty amazing that this even exists. And I think a lot of people, let alone students of architecture, let alone architects, know about this. So people from Melbourne, we know about the fight for the Walsh Street house. Over the void. In Turak and how unlikely it is that that has remained. It's really interesting when you look in this area. So many apartment buildings going up around. And you don't even notice this, do you? Because of the amount of greenery that surrounds this house. You really... It's camouflaged. You don't know it's here. Have you been here before? Did you know about this before? It's in West Hollywood. Just have a look on Google Maps if you don't know the area. Like we're talking about dense, dense Hollywood. Smack in the middle. So it's amazing that something's lasted for 101 years. Yeah. How much longer it lasts for, who knows? Like this obviously requires a lot of money to keep it maintained. Like Rick, our wonderful guide from Tuguding, was pointing out just some of the details. Roofs that stop short, that actually allow all the water. So you don't flash over the timber. So it allows the water to fall behind that. And that of course creates all these rotting zones. How is this still here? It's a hard tent, literally. Yeah, it's a hard tent. Sleeping on the roof of a hard tent. It's very temporary. I think it must be quite liberating coming from Austria originally as well. Something quite heavy. Just being able to liberate it to do something like this. That's a really good point. In Austria, you would have to have something that's just the enclosed core. So yeah, this must be liberating to do something so delicate. It almost feels like it's going to blow away. Do yourself a favour. If you're in LA at all, you've got to come and check this out. It's an amazing piece of history. And like everything we choose to go look at, it is full of lessons. Just take your time, have a look at it. Look at the plans. Oh, yeah. It is so hard to even understand it being here. So I can't wait to go back and actually look at the plans after being here. I would come to LA just for this. You did, didn't you? I did. Yeah? All right, leave some comments, guys. We want to hear if you've been here and what you thought. We love you guys. See you soon. Did you just get pew pew? Wrong country to do that. It's not loaded. Oh. Is it the wrong country or the right country? Oh, true. I'm not allowed to take these home. We have band guns in Australia. So I have to put them away. So stupid. Why do you guys tolerate this ----? I don't. I don't know.