Recognized by Wright as the earliest 'Usonian' house, La Miniatura is also the first residence to utilize Wright's highly inventive textile block building system. — architectureforsale.com
After hitting the market in 2013, La Miniatura (aka The Millard House, 1923) was originally listed at approximately $4.5MM. The final sold price hasn't been made public, but the house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and is located in Pasadena's Prospect Historic District – neighbors include Greene & Greene's Bentz House (1906), and Arthur and Alfred Heineman's Hindry House (1909).
Wright had said of the house, "I would rather have built this little house than St. Peter's in Rome."
3 Comments
The texture and attention to detail is spectacular. There is a lot of Eastern influence visible here.
Images here.
I love that particular view. It's in the backyard, but the house is on a through-lot, and there's this little iron gate you can peek through (or once could) on the back street. I used to live around the corner and for years the lot was very overgrown; that house in that yard looked just like the jungle/temple scenes in Raiders of the Lost Ark. (This photo shows it cleaned up.)
Thanks for posting all the pics, Miles.
Thanks for the link to the photos. My second year of architecture school I was given small reproductions of the floor plans (not scaleable) of this house. The assignment was to create elevations and axonometrics. Only after finishing the drawings was I told what building it was. The rest of the assignment consisted of evaluations of the circulation and structure. I have always loved this building. In the text by Barbara Lamprecht she says this was the first of the textile block houses (I knew that). What I did not know was that this house did not use rebar. I visited the Ennis house in L.A. and saw the damage that was caused by the rust from the rebar expanding and causing the blocks to crumble. Glad to hear this house has been lovingly restored. I hope it will be around for a long time.
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