CALIFORNIA HISTORICAL RESOURCES INVENTORY DATABASE
City of Pasadena
 
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Resource Summary
1780 DEVON Rd
Resource Summary
Address: 1780 DEVON Rd APN: 5704-017-004 [print]

This property is designated by the city as an individual historic resource (see "designation type" field for the specific city designation type). *
 
RESOURCE OVERVIEW
Address: 1780 DEVON Rd
City: Pasadena State: CA
Zip Code: County: Los Angeles
County Code: 37
Historic Name: CLARK RESIDENCE Common Name: CLARK RESIDENCE
APN: 5704-017-004 Zoning:
Building Sq. Ft: Site Size (Acres): 0.600
Year Built: 1957 Documented District:
District: Property Status: Designated
Resource Description:
Set on a hillside knoll below narrow and winding Devon Road, the Clark Residence is a flat-roofed, one-story house with a “T” shaped floor plan situated on its site to maximize views across the Arroyo Seco, the San Gabriel Valley, and beyond. The street side elevation is characterized by large expanses of white stucco walls inset with a clerestory window, maintaining privacy while providing light and ventilation. An extensive band of windows approximately half of the wall height provides generous amounts of daylight into the kitchen and breakfast room areas. Broad cantilevered roof sections and wooden trellises shade windows and provide filtered sunlight for the breakfast patio and waterfall fountain. The front door to the house is approached through a lush Japanese garden obscured by freestanding Japanese screens.

Just as on the street side elevation, broad cantilevered roof planes and wooden trellises provide shade and visually extend the primary living areas to the outdoors. The visual separation between the rooms inside and the patio and swimming pool is minimal. This effect is further enhanced at the southeast corner of the living room adjacent to the master bedroom, where the floor-to-ceiling windows feature a butt-joint detail, reinforcing the notion that the house is supported by a structural framework of posts and beams, not bearing walls.

One enters the house through a narrow vestibule. Once inside, the vestibule gives way to the open flowing plan of the primary living areas. The main public area of the living room and family room/dining room are visually connected by floor-to-ceiling windows running the entire length of both rooms, but are physically separated by a double-sided fireplace finished in brick. Both living areas feature expanses of blonde Japanese ash veneer wall paneling along with built-in cabinets and upholstered benches.

In all three of the bedrooms, Neutra designed built-in dressers and platform bed frames with attached night tables. The same maple veneer used in the living room and family/dining room is used for all built-in furniture, doors and doorjambs throughout the house. Above the wall-to-wall dressers, continuous expanses of windows provide generous amounts of light and ventilation. Each bedroom has views overlooking the Japanese gardens that surround the house.

It is on the patio elevation that the structural framework is most apparent. The patio elevation reads as a continuous grid of regularly spaced posts supporting the roof. The large floor-to-ceiling windows visually extend indoor and outdoor spaces into each other. From the patio, views overlook the swimming pool and small lawn area accented with stone pagodas.
Legal Description:
That por of Lot 41 lying E of following desc line: Beg at a pt in S line of Devon Rd 24.01 ft W from NE cor of sd lot the S 4 deg 18 min E 126.28 ft th S 15 deg 50 min 12 sec E 77.72 ft to a pt in N line of Linda Vista Ave dist W thereon 21.39 ft from SE cor of Lot 41. Por of 41) All of 42)
RESOURCE DETAILS
Primary Architectural Style: International /Modern Style
Secondary Architectural Style:
Architect: Richard Neutra
Builder: Richard M. Illsley
Contractor:
Context: Recent Past 
Original Owner: John Paul Clark
Original Use: Single Family Residence
Original Location:
Demolished: no
Notes:
Moved: no
Date Moved: n/a
Designation Date: n/a

* This is a simplified statement of the property's status. Please review the NRHP Status Code field on the search screen for official, adopted status language.