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by: Abrams,
Harold |
Craig
Ellwood
(1922-1992) San Diego
Project Read article on recent restoration here. Read Wikipedia entry on Craig Ellwood here. “Ellwood’s colloquially crude description captured the communicative power of his design: you put your ass to the street and you smile to the canyon,” – Alfonso Perez-Mendez (in Craig Ellwood, In the Spirit of the Time, 2003). In 1953, Chuck and Gerry Bobertz hired Craig Ellwood to design their home. “I believe we contacted Arts and Architecture who gave us Craig's phone number. We phoned him. He invited us to his home and we hired him upon our first meeting. We never saw a [Case Study] home but when we went up to see Craig at his Westwood home, we discussed many of his homes with pictures, plans, etc. He had a home-office in a living room alcove. My impression was that we asked him to keep the cost to about $15,000 and he tried to do that based on Los Angeles prices as he knew nothing about San Diego [prices],” Gerry recalled in a recent interview. While working as his first employee between March-August 1953, Ernest “Ernie” E. Jacks detailed Craig Ellwood’s design for the Bobertz House. “The house was completed the next year or, at the latest, in early 1955. The house was in effect detailed by Jacks, the only associate working for Ellwood at the time, but completed while Jerry Lomax, another associate, was in the office,” states Ellwood biographer Alfonso Perez-Mendez (Tue, 18 Apr 2000). After flying for the US Navy out of Coronado, Jacks moved to Los Angeles. According to Jacks, “Ellwood and I began the project together, toward the end I was working on the drawings solo. We designed the home in 1953, drawing in the back bedroom of Case Study House #16 where we lived and ran the architecture practice,” recalled Ernest Jacks (10/2000). After working with Ellwood for less than a year, Jacks quit the practice to attend graduate school in Arkansas. The house was under construction during most of 1954. Upon completion in early 1955 the couple began their brief life together in the house. Contrary to opinions of Ellwood biographers and former employees, friends, and family, Craig did in fact pay close attention to the Bobertz project. Gerry Bobertz Franklin recalled constant contact with Ellwood, “We phoned him nearly every evening during construction to keep him aware of progress. He came down if there appeared to be a problem. He seemed to be keenly aware if things were going according to his plans. Craig came 3-4 times during construction and we had a few conversations after. I never met Ernie Jacks,”recalled Gerry Franklin (10/2/03). The couple paid additional money for Craig Ellwood to hire landscape architect Eric Armstrong (in 1954) to draw their landscape plan. Eric worked with Craig Ellwood on several projects. Ernie Jacks recalls Armstrong landscaping Case Study House #16. Mr. Armstrong later served as the consulting landscape architect (with William Perreira) for U.C. Santa Barbara developing the campus master plan in 1963. Life for The Bobertz couple was difficult. The design principles they believed in offered a mere respite from post-war stress. Gerry recalls, “Life after World War II, was more difficult than now. People were re-building and trying to survive a difficult economy and were more serious. The "me-generation" mentality wasn't born yet. For us there was no Brubeck, martinis, nor art shows. In our twenties we felt we had to get established financially.” The Bobertz Residence (1953/55) was the first built project among a series of homes by Craig Ellwood. The first two unbuilt projects - Kelton House (1952) and Harrison House (1953) - were drawn by Jacks who carried the design principles through to the Bobertz House and Anderson House (1953/54). The series of homes was taken over by Jerrold Lomax - upon his joining the office - with Coppedge House (1953, not built), Froug House (1953, not built), Case Study House #17 (1954-56, altered beyond recognition) through to the Howard Steinman House (1955-56). While the design principles of the series were uniform, detailing of the houses reflected ideas used in earlier Ellwood projects such as the Johnson House, Zack House and Maypole Apartments. Between May 6-8, 1958 the house was advertised for sale (in the Union Tribune) for $32,950. Gerry took the first offer in September 1958 for $29,000. Gerry Franklin reflected, “I was sorry to part with my baby; I had put so much energy and time into it!.”
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