Added to the National Register of Historic Places on April 22, 2019

There are many ways to access the Palos Verdes Peninsula. All of them will take you through spectacular scenery and delightful flora. But the next time you’re down that way, avoid the temptation to take the coastal route in. Instead, take Hawthorne Blvd. and head west up the hill on Via Valmonte. It’s the best way to get a proper view of the Mirlo Gate Lodge Tower, a unique medieval-style lodging built in 1925 – though it looks as though it was built 500 years earlier.

Fairytale vibes ooze out of the mortar of the two-story tower, fashioned of unreinforced stone on the outside, plastered or wallpapered brick on the inside. It’s like a turret was removed from a French castle and plopped down on the hillside. There’s a stone fireplace on the interior, an original polygonal ceiling of hand-hewn wood beams, leaded glass windows that casts red and gold light in the sitting room on the ground floor. A dragon-shaped iron knocker and decorative hinges play up the D&D angle on the door; a short stone wall connects the tower to a stone pier with a historical plaque embedded on it. Charmant!

Mirlo’s Place in the History of Palos Verdes Estates

Mirlo Gate Lodge Tower was named after “Via Mirlo,” the former name of the street that it’s on. It was built as part of the earliest group of buildings in the upscale community of Palos Verdes Estates, now one of the wealthiest cities in the country. The idea early on was that the tower would be the eastern entrance to Palos Verdes. It was intended to house a gatekeeper who would monitor the comings and goings of residents and visitors, so it did serve a functional purpose. But it was also a smart bit of marketing. Much like Greene & Greene’s Oaklawn Bridge (see visit #103), the Mirlo Tower could be seen as a kind of aesthetic appetizer for potential Palos Verdes residents. If a humble entrance gate was this transportive, this pastoral, this well crafted, just imagine what the rest of the neighborhood looked like!

The early development of Palos Verdes Estates was overseen by the Olmsted Brothers, owners of one of the most respected landscape design and city planning firms in America. Their father Frederick Law Olmsted, Sr. was the visionary behind New York’s Central Park and Boston’s Emerald Necklace; in California, he designed the master plan for UC Berkeley, and parts of the Stanford campus. When sons John and Fred, Jr. took over the firm in the 1890s, they continued to expand their range of projects across the country.

In 1913, Olmsted Brothers joined an effort to develop the peninsula west of Long Beach into an idyllic community, called the Palos Verdes Project. For years they surveyed the area, drew maps, sketched out roadways and neighborhood plans. In effect, they were designing a city from scratch.

To help them realize the earliest buildings of the Palos Verdes Project, the Olmsteds brought aboard Clarence E. Howard, an architect they had worked with on several projects, including the pools and landscaping around the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. Howard had spent time in France around WWI, teaching architecture and city planning at the Art School for Men of the American Expeditionary Forces in Paris. While there, he became captivated by the medieval stone houses of Lot, in the Midi-Pyrénées region of southern France. 

You can clearly see the impact of Howard’s time in France on the craft and aesthetic of the Mirlo Gate Lodge Tower. As its NRHP nomination form states it, the tower is “the embodiment of the ancient art of stonemasonry and techniques that are no longer handed down” (not to mention that modern building codes would seem to preclude new structures like this, built of unreinforced stone and brick). Mirlo Tower also closely resembles a pigeonnier, a type of structure that French aristocrats frequently kept on their land during in medieval times, to store pigeons for meat. Back then, pigeons were a prized delicacy, and a special tower just for them would have been a symbol of wealth. 

A New “California Architecture” 

Howard became Chief Architect of the Palos Verdes Project in 1923, and he worked with the “Art Jury” (including architectural all-stars Myron Hunt, Robert D. Farquhar and David C. Allison) to develop design standards for the buildings to come. It was important to Howard and the rest that Palos Verdes Estates buildings expressed an aesthetic both unified, and rooted in the region. 

He achieved this in part by using the materials beneath his feet. The limestone used for the Mirlo Gate Lodge Tower was quarried right on the Peninsula. Even before the tower was built, Howard had employed this “Palos Verdes stone” for pump houses, bridges and lighthouse gateways. You can find the same stone in the patios and walkways Howard designed for other Palos Verdes institutions, like the La Venta Inn and the Palos Verdes Estates Golf Club. 

In the many residences he built for some of Palos Verdes Estates’ early residents, Howard integrated stonework into an eclectic “California Architecture” style, blending classic mission/Spanish colonial elements with the romance of old world Italian and French architecture. The style was adopted by The Palos Verdes Homes Association and promoted via its magazine, the Palos Verdes Bulletin. Pictures of his buildings appeared in real estate ads in the LA Times. In short, Howard was largely responsible for how Palos Verdes Estates looked and felt. His touch can even be seen on the area’s street signs, which he co-designed with his future wife, Lucia Barber.

Guardians of the Tower

The whole idea of a burly soldier shouting “HALT! Who goes there?” from the Mirlo Gate Lodge Tower is an attractive one. But sadly no proper gatekeepers ever called it home. Instead various city employees lodged there, including a gardener and a policeman. 

Beginning in 1970, a builder named John Doty became its sole occupant. Doty was well aware of Mirlo because his family-owned construction company had installed water lines all over Palos Verdes. His original rent was $75 a month, and the lease was for 12 months. He ended up staying 48 years. Doty added the scratchy brown wallpaper, added an entrance to the east side so that the wind wouldn’t blow out the fire whenever you opened the door…oh, and he hung a giant medieval sword in the bedroom. At some point in the ‘70s, the rock wall and pool were added on the northeastern side. 

After 48 years, Doty moved out in 2018. I haven’t found any evidence online that there’s a new caretaker, and when I visited, there were no signs that it was occupied. The fountain was dry, the grounds looked like they could use some sweeping, and the charming mailbox out front – shaped like a replica of the Mirlo Tower – was stuffed full of dusty newspaper. 

POINT BEING: If you’re interested in living in a 508-square-foot medieval-style bachelor pad, hit up the Palos Verdes Estates City Manager’s Office at citymanager@pvestates.org.

Recommended Reading

+Mirlo Gate Lodge Tower’s NRHP nomination form (PDF)

+A gate to the past in Palos Verdes Estates (Easy Reader, 2019)

+This tiny, medieval-like stone tower in Palos Verdes Estates needs a new caretaker (Daily Breeze, 2018)

+Palos Verdes Historical Society+Palos Verdes Library District – Local History