Los Angeles Conservancy: The Sixties Turn 50

The L.A. Conservancy and Modern Committee celebrate the 1960s

L.A. Conservancy Modern Committee website

Why the Sixties?

Case Study House 22 (Stahl House) by Tim Street-Porter

Case Study House #22/The Stahl House (Pierre Koenig, 1960), an icon of Los Angeles. Photo by Tim Street-Porter.

This year marks an important milestone in the preservation of mid-century modern architecture, as structures built in 1960 reach the ripe old age of fifty. While turning fifty strikes fear in the hearts of many—especially in Los Angeles—it’s actually good for important buildings, since this age is the widely accepted threshold for consideration as historic. At the same time, preserving resources from the sixties poses new challenges, both technical and philosophical.

To celebrate Greater Los Angeles’ rich legacy of 1960s architecture, and explore how best to preserve it, the Los Angeles Conservancy and its Modern Committee are pursuing a nine-month education and outreach program. Launched in late September 2009, the program combines events such as tours and discussions with the online activities on this website. Read on for more about why preserving sixties resources is so important, and visit the site often to learn more, share your stories, and help choose the People’s Choice “Top 60 of the ‘60s”!

The importance of Greater L.A.’s 1960s architecture can no longer be denied.

“That can’t be historic—I remember when it was built!”

Have you ever heard someone say that about a building dear to your heart? Well, as time marches on and we get older, so do the places we love—unless they’re torn down first.

Cinerama Dome (Welton Becket and Associates, 1963); saved after a multi-year preservation effort in the 1990s. Photo by Larry Underhill.

Although the City of Los Angeles and State of California don’t require resources to be fifty years old in order to gain landmark status, the widespread perception is that younger buildings just aren’t old enough to be considered significant. Plus, the National Register of Historic Places has a general guideline that eligible resources be at least fifty years old.

The all-volunteer Modern Committee (ModCom) of the Los Angeles Conservancy has dealt with the “fifty-year hurdle” since its founding in 1984, long before the renaissance of mid-century modernism.

“Early on, the idea of preserving modernist resources was hard for many people to swallow. In the 1990s, buildings of the fifties gained credibility, but people couldn’t even think about the sixties as a preservation issue,” says John English, an architectural historian, former Conservancy board member, and longtime ModCom member. “Now, here we are! This is it! There is no longer any doubt that enough time has passed for these structures to merit preservation.”

The sixties were a particularly important decade for Los Angeles.

The 1960s were a remarkable period in U.S. history and a watershed moment in the history of Los Angeles. Against the national backdrop of the Kennedy era, the civil rights movement, the space race, and the Age of Aquarius, Los Angeles developed its freeway system, the aerospace industry flourished, the population boomed, and our love affair with the automobile was at its peak.

DWP Building, Conservancy Events Sept. 2009

Los Angeles Department of Water and Power Building (Albert C. Martin and Associates, 1965). Photo by Flora Chou.

This all spurred an incredibly prolific building period in the Los Angeles region, particularly in terms of civic and commercial development. Companies, cities, and institutions pursued ambitious building programs of tremendous scale.

“It was during the sixties that Los Angeles first became a ‘world city,’” says English. “It was also when we fully realized much of the postwar promise that had been building up steam throughout the late forties and fifties. Commercial architects really hit their stride in terms of large-scale development. And Los Angeles International Airport embodied the jet age. When you arrived in Los Angeles, you knew that Los Angeles had arrived.”

Preservation also took hold in the U.S. during the decade. The City of Los Angeles created its Cultural Heritage Ordinance in 1962, becoming one of the first cities in the U.S. to do so. The National Historic Preservation Act followed in 1966. Ironically, this came largely in response to the destruction of older landmarks to make way for new structures—many of which have now gained their own significance and are the subject of this very program.

Explore an interactive timeline of the 1960s

We’ve lost, and are losing, important buildings from the sixties largely because people don’t understand why they’re significant.

The Los Angeles area has lost a number of important structures from the 1960s, from posh homes and high-profile commercial buildings to public libraries and one of the region’s last single-screen drive-in theatres. Just a few examples include:

Azusa Foothill Drive-In (1961), Azusa (pictured at right)—Despite a multi-year effort by the Conservancy, local residents, and preservationists statewide, the last single-screen drive-in theatre in Los Angeles County was razed in 2005 by owner Azusa Pacific University; only the neon sign remains.
Hollywood Star Lanes (1962), Hollywood—This beloved community gathering place, and Hollywood's only bowling alley for 40 years, was demolished in 2002 by the Los Angeles Unified School District.
Irving Stone Residence (Richard Dorman & Associates, 1961), Beverly Hills—This elegant example of residential modernism was razed in 2008 as part of the nationwide teardown trend.
Los Angeles Public Library branches in Brentwood, Encino/Tarzana, Hyde Park, and Woodland Hills (pictured at right)—at least some of them victims of sweeping bond measures to fund library construction.
National Theater (Harold Levitt, 1969), Westwood Village—Demolished in 2008 for redevelopment; site remains vacant.
Valley Music Center (Hawkins and Lindsey, 1964)—Demolished circa 2006 for new development after the city rejected its nomination as a local landmark; the site remains vacant.
Welton Becket and Associates Office Building (Welton Becket and Associates, 1960), Century City—The headquarters of one of the most prominent architectural firms in Los Angeles (and the largest in the world in the 1960s) was demolished in 2005.

Many other significant sixties buildings have fallen to the wrecking ball, have been altered beyond recognition, or currently face demolition.

Read about current 1960s preservation issues

Preserving more recent structures, like those from the sixties, poses new challenges.

Preserving buildings from the 1960s is rife with challenges and opportunities. On the one hand, the burden of the “50-year hurdle” lessens with each passing year. On the other hand, we face new technical and philosophical issues.

The approaches and materials used in much 1960s architecture call for new ways of thinking about its preservation. For instance:

Many sixties buildings feature mass-produced materials that are easily replicated, and/or experimental materials that perhaps weren’t designed to last for generations. Is actual historic fabric as important for these structures as it is for older structures of stone, brick, and old-growth wood?
How do we adapt car-oriented designs to the contemporary desire for pedestrian-friendly communities? While a number of 1960s architects pioneered energy-efficient modern design, many others didn’t, instead taking full advantage of the era’s cheap and plentiful energy.
How do we enhance the sustainability of these buildings while maintaining their historic character?

The irony is not lost on us that a key tenet of modernism was rejection of the past. The many complexities and contradictions inherent in preserving 1960s modernism make it a fascinating topic with very real, broad implications—particularly for Los Angeles, given its sheer amount of structures from the era. We hope you’ll explore these and other issues with us over the coming months, and we welcome your thoughts.

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