Added to the National Register of Historic Places on June 17, 1982

Behold! The humble bungalow court, and its felicitous arrangement of detached structures lining a central walkway or courtyard. At its height, this type of housing was everywhere in the LA area – some 16,000 people lived in 1,200 LA courts as of 1915, according to a Los Angeles Housing Commission survey. And nowhere was the bungalow spree more apparent than in Pasadena, the city that birthed this kind of living. Though many of them have been demolished, there are more than 100 bungalow courts left in Pasadena, in architectural styles as varied as the people that lived in them.

Bowen Court is the undisputed grandaddy of them all. It was neither the first (that would be Saint Francis Court, partially reconfigured elsewhere) nor is it the oldest in its original configuration (Gartz Court, moved in the ‘80s to avoid demolition). But Bowen Court is the earliest Pasadena bungalow court that you can still see in its original context.

When Bowen was built in 1911, Pasadena was 25 years old. It was evolving from a real estate boomtown for wealthy white midwesterners and easterners, to a tourist haven for sunshine seekers, to a mini metropolis of its own. Pasadena’s population tripled to 30,291 between 1900 and 1910, as it annexed neighboring areas and welcomed working class people from all over. Over the next two decades it grew by another 150%, to more than 76,000 in 1930. And all those new people needed a place to stay.

The bungalow court was an attractive option for both transients and long-term residents who couldn’t afford to buy or build. Housing historians point to how the bungalow court offered a balance between privacy and community. Bowen Court is a perfect example of all that. For your $40 to $50 a month ($1200 – $1500 today), you’d get many of the amenities of a standalone, single-family dwelling. They’re mostly detached from each other (some units are attached, duplex-style), and each has a living room, kitchen, bedroom(s) and closets. These units were built to be cozy and compact with a fireplace and tons of built-in storage, and plentiful windows for natural light and cross-ventilation.

Socializing is also ingrained in the design of Bowen Court. Its 23 buildings are arranged around a wide, L-shaped pathway, with a spine of gorgeous globe lamps. The walkway becomes a communal courtyard – everyone walks down it to reach the front gate or the small parking area in the back, and there are numerous shaded nooks and small lawns to duck into for a conversation or a daydream. About halfway down the court, there’s a rustic two-story clubhouse where residents used to be able to meet for tea. It now houses the landlord’s office and the laundry room.

Bowen Court was the work of Alfred & Arthur Heineman, two brothers who operated a successful architecture firm in LA in the early 20th century, despite their near-total lack of formal training. Before Bowen, they designed the second-ever bungalow court in Pasadena, Los Robles Court, now sadly gone. Arthur Heineman also gave us the Milestone Mo-Tel Inn in San Luis Obispo, said to be the world’s very first motel (more about that here). And if you still doubt the man’s ingenuity, consider that he adapted the idea of the bungalow court from a design he had made for a sanatorium in Marion, Ohio the same year.

…there will necessarily be a great variety in the arrangement of the houses involving a study of the entire court as a whole, calling for great ingenuity in planning and avoiding the effect of rows of houses according to the old practice. As a natural consequence there will be a great variety in the designs of the different bungalows. But a general harmony must be preserved, even though they may differ in materials and even in color. In other words, the successful bungalow court designer must be an artist in the broadest sense of the word.

-Arthur Heineman, quoted in The Western Architect, vol. 28 no. 2, February 1919

There’s both variety and aesthetic harmony at work at Bowen Court. The units are varied in roofline and floor plan (a couple of the connected units are mirrors of each other), and each has its distinctive details. A current resident pointed out to me that many of the units have a unique decorative pattern on the entry door hardware that’s echoed by the window pattern on the door itself. Still, they’re visually united by the craftsman details that repeat throughout the place: front porches and low, intersecting gable roofs, overhanging eaves and shingles or horizontal siding on the outside, plus foundations of clinker brick, stone and concrete. This style was the height of fashion in Pasadena at the time.

The “Bowen” in the court’s name was developer J. Frank Bowen, whose many real estate wheelings and dealings were often reported in the LA Times in the early 1900s. Bungalow courts were lucrative business for industrious developers, who could eke more profit out of a large lot by renting or selling multiple units as opposed to one or two larger houses. “The greater the depth of the lot the larger will be the percentage of profit on the rentals,” Heineman explained to Western Architect in 1919, “because certain items of upkeep must be provided for and the larger the court the more the cost of them is distributed.” Economically sound reasoning, yes. But this whiff of “design as commercialism” had its detractors. Architect Charles Greene, half of that other brother-brother duo working in Pasadena at the time, once said of Bowen Court that “It would seem to have no other reason for being than that of making money for the investor. The style and design of each unit is uniform, making for the monotony and dreariness of a factory district.” And then the stinger: “This is a good example of what not to do.” OUCH.

To be sure, Bowen Court was one of the more luxe courts in Pasadena, and one of the largest. It cost over $41,000 to build (about $1.3 million in today’s money), and it’s built on a significantly wider lot than many of its contemporaries, allowing for more luxurious communal space and landscaping.

When it was first opened, Bowen Court boasted lush plantings, including a modest palm at the front entrance. A Japanese caretaker tended the garden regularly in the early days. In the century since, the place has blossomed into an urban forest, with palms, oaks and camphor trees looming over the bungalows and intermingling with the gardens of the residents. One resident planted rose bushes down the middle of the walkway, ensuring a fragrant stroll to the front gate during springtime. The natural splendor supports an entire ecosystem of birds, squirrels and skunks. Cats used to have the run of the place, until a couple years ago when the landlord asked residents to keep them indoors.

As you’d expect from century-plus-old construction, there have been plenty of alterations made to the units here over the years. The beams that projected beyond the eaves started rotting from weather damage, so they were sawn back at some point. Some units feature additions, a room added here, some extra closet space added there; and the kitchen counters and bathrooms are definitely newer than 1911. Most of the exterior walls have been painted over, and the door frames and window trim – originally unpainted, stained wood – are now white. One tenant opted to strip the trim paint back to its original state, and it’s glorious. They should all look like that.

There were larger-scale changes too, like the entire unit at the northeast end that used to be the backhouse of an adjoining property. It’s covered in stucco and very much not in the same craftsman style as the rest of the bungalows. But ya know – even the black sheep is part of the herd. We’ll consider that unit adopted.

What I love most are the small details that connect Bowen Court to a bygone era of living, like the little built-in service doors where the milkman used to put the day’s fresh bottle, and the double doors above the laundry room that once opened to a hay loft, so you could refuel your horses. There are these odd rectangular bits that jut out of several of the units, which were meant to accommodate slide-out beds – a space-saving alternative to the murphy bed. My favorite of the vestigial features at Bowen Court are the old wooden signs that still hang from some units, each with a different Spanish-inspired name (e.g. Hermosura, Ynez, Toloso). Can you imagine addressing a postcard to “Mom, c/o Bowen Court, Mariposa Bungalow” instead of a number?

It says a lot about Bowen Court that there are so many residents who have lived here for decades, and multiple who have switched units during their time here. The place is rent-controlled, yes – but there’s also something magnificent about getting a little slice of garden utopia, plus a built-in social network, should you choose to take advantage of it. Residents told me stories about lifelong friendships they’ve built between neighbors, or how nice it was to always have someone to watch your kid, or to drink a glass of wine with during the depths of the COVID-19 pandemic.

A non-original gate now sits atop the clinker-brick and rock entrance. Bummer that it interrupts the view from the street, but it only adds to the impression of Bowen Court as a hidden oasis.

Endless thanks to the residents of Bowen Court for welcoming me into their homes, and feeding me juicy details I couldn’t have gotten anywhere else. And much gratitude to Kristen Norton and Andrew Salimian of Pasadena Heritage for sending over the Western Architect article and historic photo of Bowen Court.

Sources & Recommend Reading

+ Anderton, Frances: Common Ground: Multifamily Housing in Los Angeles (Angel City Press, 2022)

+ “Bungalow Courts in Pasadena” (Pasadena Planning & Community Development Department)

+ Gish, Todd Douglas: “Bungalow Court Housing in Los Angeles, 1900-1930: Top-down Innovation? Or Bottom-up Reform?” (Southern California Quarterly, Vol. 91, No. 4, Winter 2009-2010)

+ Gregory, Tim: “THE JAMES ALLEN FREEMAN HOUSE: A History” (1999, rev. 2018) 

+ Heritage: A Short History of Pasadena (City of Pasadena)

+ Kaplan, Sam Hall: “Paying Court to a Neighborly L.A. Residential Design Style” (Los Angeles Times, April 2, 1988)

+ Meares, Hadley: “Bungalow Courts Make the Best Neighbors” (Curbed LA, June 23, 2020)

+ Millar, Louis DuP.: “The Bungalow Courts of California: Bowen’s Court” (The House Beautiful, vol. 40 no. 6, November 1916 – via Google Books)

+ “Pasadena Census and Population” (Pasadena Planning & Community Development Department)

+ Sicha, Richard J., Pasadena Heritage: Bungalow Courts of Pasadena NRHP nomination form

+ Wight, Peter B.: “Bungalow Courts in California” (The Western Architect, vol. 28 no. 2, February 1919 – via Google Books)