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Case Study House #16

Case Study House #16 is the only surviving, intact example of Craig Ellwood's designs for the Case Study House program.

Place Details

• Craig Ellwood Associates

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• Private Residence - Do Not Disturb

Property Type

• Single-Family Residential
• Los Angeles

Case Study House #16 was the first of three houses in Arts & Architecture magazine’s Case Study House program designed by Craig Ellwood, a contractor with no formal architectural training. It remains highly intact today, and is the only surviving, intact example of Ellwood’s designs for the program; his built designs for #17 and #18 have both been altered through subsequent remodelling.

Ellwood was trained as an engineer and had a passion for using industrial materials and construction techniques in residential architecture. As a result, Case Study House #16 exhibits a highly rational design and is constructed of steel, glass and concrete.

Completed in 1952, the house was innovative in its use of exposed steel structural framing, and floor-to-ceiling glass walls took advantage of spectacular views. 

The one-story, flat-roofed residence was built on a flat pad in the hills of Bel-Air with magnificent views to the south and west. The layout and siting take into account the views and sun orientation, taking full advantage of both.

From the street the house presents itself as a glowing, floating glass pavilion. Translucent glass panels screen the house from the street, while frameless floor-to-ceiling glass walls in the living room merge with floors, ceilings, and a massive natural rock fireplace that extends through the glass to the covered patio.

View the National Register of Historic Places Nomination

Issues including Case Study House #16

Case study houses, related content, bailey house (case study house #21), st. martha’s episcopal church, st. john’s in the valley methodist church (demolished).

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Salzman House / Case Study House nº 16

Introduction, description.

• Access – Access to the house with a beautiful but free parking gate that allows easy access, for up to two cars.
• Bedrooms – The bedrooms have large floor to ceiling windows overlooking a courtyard and adjacent Half hidden by the exterior walls of translucent glass.
• Patio – The outdoor courtyard, designed as a relaxing stay for life and social outdoors, home to a large open fireplace with stone quarry site for an electric barbecue skewer.
• Hall and Kitchen – The large living room with a wall of glass overlooking the courtyard houses an open kitchen, which incorporates the same and that a “bar” creates an eating area.

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Archigraphie

Case study house n°16′, by c. ellwood.

Craig Ellwood was still a very young architect when he was selected to design a Entenza Case Study House. This is the first in the series of three villas he designed for the Case Study House Program. It offers a house here where he developed while working on multiple outdoor spaces qualities that come to extend and enrich the home of various and unexpected ways….

Constructive options

• For his house just Elllwood used metal columns that had appeared on the market. Indeed, due to the decline of the railway, many found themselves unused rails produced. They were recast which raised metal companies to develop new product lines …
• The use of square columns instead of columns H can save a lot of money, they are lighter and can simplify a number of details such as those bindings woodwork.
• The beams used are I to 6 inches and 36 feet long.
• Translucent panels 10 feet in height are treated as extended walls of the house.
• The interior walls of the house are also treated as screens. They are of the same material as the exterior walls to express continuity between interior and exterior spaces spaces. These panels are by exposing the structure which is painted black. They are off the ground, and are separated from the ceiling by a transom window.
• The villa consists of a grid of 8 feet.
• The house is divided into two areas occupied by the circulations, one inner and one outer longitudinally extending in the direction of the project.
• The boundary with the street is freely drawn by a solid line turn opaque or translucent tower. This watershed limits any tower covered and not confined areas (like the porch); other spaces, enclosed and discovered (as the court of children); or some interior spaces and with others outside. This boundary separates Similarly, the prices of the rooms from the street by a series of panels of translucent glass …
• The indoor and outdoor spaces are organized around the two perpendicular axes carry the project.
• The partition between social spaces and individual spaces is along a North-South axis passing at the entrance.
• It amazing how close the villa whose area is in a simple rectangle, which is built with a completely systematic metal structure does not prevent to achieve a wide variety of spaces and uses. Each space is fully qualified. This remark is particularly sensitive to the game of indoor and outdoor spaces.
• This is illustrated for example in the input sequence: the porch is divided into two parts, creating a covered walkway for pedestrian access. Basically, the villa allows a double entry: service entrance that allows access to the court and the kitchen but also main entrance angles. The patio at the entrance allows movement of the light at the output while creating a view.
• Each room is extended by outdoor spaces in direct continuity with the interior space. The “master bedroom” has a double orientation opening on two distinct areas, each with a different status: an enclosed space and privacy to the east; a terrace that opens fully to the outside overlooking the far south …
• Similarly, the living areas have a triple orientation with three types of large spaces.
• Open to the outside distant and providing a wide view to the south: the “view terrace” as baptized Craig Ellwood.
• Open to foreign direct space and close to the garden: the “living-terrace” is protected under large pergolas. It comes in direct extension of the dining room.
• Much more protected, the “child-play” may have lived both as a space service and much more closed and intimate space.
• The position and status of the service areas is much less clear. Ellwood seems to make the difference in service areas such as bathrooms that are treated as opaque and irremovable cores while the space kitchens are treated as completely at Koenig transferable manner … These spaces are scattered and fragmented in the plan of a house.
• The diagram shows the spatial sequence extending along one of the two structural axes of the project …
• From west to east, succeeding are: the “living terrace” / “child court” / the entrance patio / porch for cars.

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Craig Ellwood’s Case Study House No. 16 seeks $3 million in Bel-Air

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For some of the most stunning Midcentury architecture in L.A., look no further than the Case Study House series. Created by Arts & Architecture magazine after World War II, the program employed some of the era’s most noted architects to explore aesthetic and affordable housing prototypes.

Architects including Richard Neutra and Pierre Koenig mocked up 36 designs, and roughly two dozen were built. No. 16, a floating glass pavilion built by Craig Ellwood, just hit the market for $2.995 million.

It’s one of three homes Ellwood designed for the series and the only one still intact, according to the Los Angeles Conservancy. The other two (such as the onetime Beverly Hills residence of baseball great Hank Greenberg ) have been altered through remodels.

A striking concoction of steel, concrete and glass, the single-story home sits on a flat lot with sweeping canyon views. Translucent glass panels shroud the property from the street, while an exposed steel exterior frames floor-to-ceiling walls of glass throughout the 1,664-square-foot floor plan.

Inside are two bedrooms, two bathrooms and an indoor-outdoor open floor plan. A natural rock fireplace anchors the space, extending through glass walls onto a covered patio. Outdoor lounges and lawns complete the landscaped grounds.

Aaron Kirman, Dalton Gomez and Weston Littlefield of Aaron Kirman Group at Compass hold the listing.

A few other Case Study homes have surfaced for sale as of late. In 2017, actress Kristen Wiig bought No. 10 in Pasadena for $2.96 million. No. 21 , a glass box perched in the Hollywood Hills, sold for $3.26 million earlier this year.

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Jack Flemming covers real estate for the Los Angeles Times. He was raised in St. Louis and studied journalism at the University of Missouri. Before joining The Times as an intern in 2017, he wrote for the Columbia Missourian and Politico Europe.

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Craig Ellwood and Case Study House #16

12 mid-century listings from austin, tx to kalamazoo, mi.

In 1945, John Entenza had a bold idea. As the editor of Arts + Architecture magazine, Etenza was an early evangelist for modernism, which still enjoyed less than mainstream appeal.  Seeking to demonstrate that aesthetic experimental housing could be as comfortable and affordable as traditional housing, he came up with a pretty innovative concept. Enter the Case Study program, a project offering architects the opportunity to design cost-effective prototypical homes utilizing direct discounts from building products manufacturers. All of the homes were to be featured in future issues of Arts + Architecture magazine. The program was launched in Southern California and slew of talented young architects enlisted, including Charles Eames, Eero Saarienen, Pierre Koening, Ralph Rapson and the protagonist of today’s post, Craig Ellwood. 

Craig Ellwood was born Jon Nelson Burke in Clarendon, Texas. His family moved West, ultimately settling in Los Angeles. After serving in the U.S. Army Air Corps, Ellwood made his way back to L.A. where he worked in construction and general contracting. Along with his brother Cleve and two friends, Ellwood formed his first company. They named the enterprise ‘Craig Ellwood’, inspired in part by the group’s favorite liquor store, Lords and Elwood. The moniker was impactful enough that Jon Burke would go on to legally take the name for himself in 1951.

While working with his brother, Ellwood gained invaluable experience on new home builds across the Los Angeles area, becoming especially skilled as a construction cost estimator. This intimate familiarity with building materials would benefit him greatly in the next phase of his career. For over five years, Ellwood also studied structural engineering through UCLA extension night school. Although not technically an architect, Ellwood started to receive his first commissions to design private residences based on his reputation in the industry. In 1951, his new company, Craig Ellwood Design, was formed.

Just one year in and still green in his career in custom home design, Ellwood became the latest recruit of the Case Study Program. Case Study House No. 16, built in 1952, followed shortly after. It was the first of three houses Ellwood created for the Arts & Architecture  magazine program. Today, house #16 is the only of the three still intact.

The Case Study House no. 16 was designed for a gorgeous hillside site in Bel Air with sweeping city views. The steel-and-glass house is enclosed with floating screens rather than floor-to-ceiling partitions, ensuring ample access to the best views. Fir frames the glass planes to create a warm contrast to the painted steel. A natural rock fireplace anchors the space, extending through glass walls onto a covered patio. The layout exemplifies the indoor-outdoor tenet of the Case Study program. Still in near original condition today, the home is currently recognized as a city landmark by the Los Angeles Conservancy.

“I was never tied to standard detailing or inhibited from trying out new methods. When you haven’t been taught that some detail is impossible, you approach it with confidence and innocence.” -Craig Ellwood

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Craig Ellwood’s Bel Air Case Study House No. 16 goes up for sale

From 1945 to 1966, Arts & Architecture magazine ran the Case Study House program, a radical experiment in American residential architecture which commissioned major architects to design and build efficient and affordable model homes to accommodate the postwar housing boom. Modest in size compared to its local counterparts, the 1,750-square-foot Case Study House No. 16 in Bel Air  has been put on the market for $2.9 million by Aaron Kirman, Dalton Gomez, and Weston Littlefield of Compass. 

The magazine commissioned over 30 homes during the program, designed by architects including Richard Neutra, Charles and Ray Eames, and Eero Saarinen. Completed in 1953, the Case Study House No. 16 was one of three that engineer Craig Ellwood built for the program. According to the Los Angeles Conservancy, it is the only intact example of his designs, as the No. 17 and 18 have both been drastically remodeled. While the home, a city landmark, had its floors replaced 50 years ago, the building is largely in its original condition. 

The two-bedroom, two-bathroom home is an archetypal example of midcentury modern architecture, with its modular steel and concrete construction, expansive walls of glass, fir siding, natural rock fireplace, and cantilevered roof. It sits perched atop a Bel Air hillside, offering broad views of the city while appearing as a floating glass pavilion from the street. A wall of frosted glass surrounds the home and provides a level of privacy for the otherwise completely transparent house. 

The home was listed on the N ational Register of Historic Places ( NRHP ) in July 2013 for its significant association with the Case Study House Program, the “innovative use of exposed steel structural framing,” and it’s “high level of integrity of design, materials, and workmanship” according to the 2013 NRHP registration form. This is the first time the home has been on the market in 50 years.

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Case Study House No. 16 hits the market for $3M in Bel Air

Be the third owner ever of this piece of architectural history

The Case Study House program, sponsored by Arts & Architecture and designed between the 1940s and 1960s, was designed to create affordable homes that could be constructed quickly to accommodate growing postwar families. Interestingly enough, they ended up being built in neighborhoods that went on to become synonymous with luxury homes—case in point, Case Study House No. 16 (also called Case Study House for 1953) in Bel Air .

Designed by Craig Ellwood, the two-bedroom, two-bathroom house sits on a flat lot with views galore. “From the street the house presents itself as a glowing, floating glass pavilion,” says the Los Angeles Conservancy.

The modular steel house features walls of glass—including exterior panels of frosted glass— grooved fir siding, a natural rock fireplace, a cantilevered roof, and a design that aims to “bring the indoors out and the outdoors in.”

1811 Bel Air Road, a city landmark, is almost entirely original. The floors are a later addition, added 50 years ago, which is also when the house last traded hands. It’s listed for $2.9 million with Aaron Kirman, Dalton Gomez and Weston Littlefield of Compass.

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Real Estate & Architecture in Los Angeles

Buyer grabs significant piece of Los Angeles architecture in Bel Air

Seizing the moment to own a home with architectural pedigree, a buyer grabs Craig Ellwood ’s iconic Case Study House no.16 after only one day on the market.

Built between 1951 and 1953, the Salzman House (also called Case Study House for 1953) is the first of three homes Ellwood designed for the  Case Study House Program , sponsored by  Arts &  Architecture . Measuring 1,664 square feet, the one-story, flat-roofed residence stands in near original condition on a flat pad in the hills of Bel-Air.

Translucent glass panels screen the two-bedroom, two-bathroom house from the street. Beyond the panels, the steel  post-and-beam construction  “has a predominantly rectangular plan with a small volume extending to the north for a two-car carport.”

The dwelling’s steel frame supports exterior glass walls and “grooved Douglas fir siding, while walls of hollow clay tile block or obscure glass delineate exterior spaces.” Features include stunning views and an effortless indoor-outdoor connection achieved through extensive use of floor-to-ceiling glass walls and a large natural rock fireplace extending through the glass to the covered patio.

Designated a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument in 2017, the home is listed for $2.9 million.

Listing courtesy of Aaron Kirman – Compass

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The Unique Burial of a Child of Early Scythian Time at the Cemetery of Saryg-Bulun (Tuva)

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Pages:  379-406

In 1988, the Tuvan Archaeological Expedition (led by M. E. Kilunovskaya and V. A. Semenov) discovered a unique burial of the early Iron Age at Saryg-Bulun in Central Tuva. There are two burial mounds of the Aldy-Bel culture dated by 7th century BC. Within the barrows, which adjoined one another, forming a figure-of-eight, there were discovered 7 burials, from which a representative collection of artifacts was recovered. Burial 5 was the most unique, it was found in a coffin made of a larch trunk, with a tightly closed lid. Due to the preservative properties of larch and lack of air access, the coffin contained a well-preserved mummy of a child with an accompanying set of grave goods. The interred individual retained the skin on his face and had a leather headdress painted with red pigment and a coat, sewn from jerboa fur. The coat was belted with a leather belt with bronze ornaments and buckles. Besides that, a leather quiver with arrows with the shafts decorated with painted ornaments, fully preserved battle pick and a bow were buried in the coffin. Unexpectedly, the full-genomic analysis, showed that the individual was female. This fact opens a new aspect in the study of the social history of the Scythian society and perhaps brings us back to the myth of the Amazons, discussed by Herodotus. Of course, this discovery is unique in its preservation for the Scythian culture of Tuva and requires careful study and conservation.

Keywords: Tuva, Early Iron Age, early Scythian period, Aldy-Bel culture, barrow, burial in the coffin, mummy, full genome sequencing, aDNA

Information about authors: Marina Kilunovskaya (Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation). Candidate of Historical Sciences. Institute for the History of Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Dvortsovaya Emb., 18, Saint Petersburg, 191186, Russian Federation E-mail: [email protected] Vladimir Semenov (Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation). Candidate of Historical Sciences. Institute for the History of Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Dvortsovaya Emb., 18, Saint Petersburg, 191186, Russian Federation E-mail: [email protected] Varvara Busova  (Moscow, Russian Federation).  (Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation). Institute for the History of Material Culture of the Russian Academy of Sciences.  Dvortsovaya Emb., 18, Saint Petersburg, 191186, Russian Federation E-mail:  [email protected] Kharis Mustafin  (Moscow, Russian Federation). Candidate of Technical Sciences. Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology.  Institutsky Lane, 9, Dolgoprudny, 141701, Moscow Oblast, Russian Federation E-mail:  [email protected] Irina Alborova  (Moscow, Russian Federation). Candidate of Biological Sciences. Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology.  Institutsky Lane, 9, Dolgoprudny, 141701, Moscow Oblast, Russian Federation E-mail:  [email protected] Alina Matzvai  (Moscow, Russian Federation). Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology.  Institutsky Lane, 9, Dolgoprudny, 141701, Moscow Oblast, Russian Federation E-mail:  [email protected]

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The Only Surviving Craig Ellwood Case Study House Asks $2.9M

The home displays several applications of the same materials—metal, glass, and concrete—a key characteristic of most Ellwood homes.

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