Image courtesy Jeremy Hunter

Until two weeks ago, my wife Tomo and I had the great pleasure of being stewards of Whitney Smith's Holmes House. It was built by Jackson and Evelyn Holmes in 1941. In 2021, it became LA County Historic Landmark #8.

What made this house so special was not that it was gigantic, ostentatious, or glamorous, but that it was built for a middle-class family interested in the power of good design.

The way light illuminated the house in winter and stayed out in the summer was magical. It used convection to naturally cool the house, which was often 10 degrees cooler inside than outside. Only in 2023 did we install AC. It was an "Eco-House" before "Eco-houses" existed.

Just like Frank Lloyd Wright's Imperial Hotel in Tokyo, it was built on a series of pylons which insulated it from seismic movement. The house was well-proportioned, seamlessly connected inside with outside, and was a cocoon of comfort in a turbulent world. Whitney Smith would use the ideas from this house for his later Case Study Houses.

Evelyn, the original client, lived in the home for more than 60 years before she passed away. I can understand why. This house made everyday life magical.

We received so many messages from people who visited or stayed here and the deep impression the space made on them. It was a beautiful container in which to have meaningful conversations...and we are hearing from many how those conversations were often life-changing. This is one of the great unseen legacies of this enchanting place.

It was life-changing, even for the dead. Strange knocking the first night we slept in the house eventually led to discovering a man's ashes hidden in the bathroom since 1964. We found his descendants, and he is now happily interred at the Oregon National Cemetary.

So many people helped us get landmark status, including the good folks at Altadena Heritage, Jocelyn Gibbs Smith, Barbara Lamprecht, Greg Goldin, Ted Wells, Dean Edwards, and Debi Howell Ardila. 

Evelyn's grandson, Mike Holmes, generously sent us photos, diary entries, and fascinating ephemera about the house. Skilled artisans and designers like Terry Allen, David Cuttriss, Paul Delmont, Bo Sundius, Hisako Ichiki, and Tetsu Morioka took the house’s inherent beauty to another level.

I gave a talk for Altadena Heritage about the whole process. (Starts about 17:00)

Thank God we donated the original blueprints to the UCSB Art Design and Architecture Museum Archive, or else they'd be destroyed, too.

I truly miss this special place. My wife and I wanted to live here until we died. I'm deeply sorry that Los Angeles has lost a piece of its cultural heritage.

Holmes House, we dearly loved you so much. It was truly an honor to take care of you. It was an honor to preserve the legacy of Whitney Smith. Thank you for being our treasured place. We will keep your spirit alive in our next home.