Buff, Straub & Hensman’s post & beam home for one of Hollywood’s all-time great graphic designers, Saul Bass

Added to the National Register of Historic Places on July 24, 2013

Completed in 1958, this was one of the later houses in the Case Study program begun by Arts & Architecture Magazine in the late ‘40s as a sort of incubator for new residential architecture. It was designed by the respected firm of Buff, Straub & Hensman, who made a name for themselves building post-WWII housing in SoCal (They’ve got several other houses on the National Register of Historic Places, including the Norton and Frank residents in San Rafael Heights, just west of Pasadena).

The original owners were Saul Bass, a graphic designer responsible for iconic title sequences and posters for Hitchcock, Wilder, Kubrick & Scorsese, and his first wife Dr. Ruth Bass, a biochemist.

+Read about Buff, Straub & Hensman @ LA Conservancy website

Fun fact: the house is located on a stretch of Santa Rosa Ave. known as Christmas Tree Lane (see visit #27), another Altadena landmark on the National Register of Historic Places.

Watch the below video to see my dad, a former architect, explain what’s special about the Bass House’s construction!

Recommended Reading

+Intro to the Case Study House program, including the 1945 announcement from Arts & Architecture

+Map of Case Study Houses in LA (Curbed)

+My visit to Case Study House 1 in Toluca Lake