Mid-Century Modern Glass House on a 3,000-Acre Ranch | House Tour

I loved coming up here uh again I was away at school for high school I was away at school for college it was the thing I mainly came home for I did a lot of horseback riding you know I helped work cattle I you know enjoyed the place I would go camping my sisters similarly it was just a special place my name is Steven Wy and I am the son of the family who built this house in 1961 we're in North Fork California which is partway between Fresno and yosee um near the Bass Lake area with basically in the foothills of the sieras summing up with this house is is not easy it is certainly a midcentury modern house it has a very Oriental flavor to it and I think that's partly because one of the Architects working on it was Japanese it also brings in a lot of nature in this area all of the stone in this house was quarried just up the road from here the architect of this house was John Rex of the firm of hamal and Rex The Firm was principally a commercial Architecture Firm uh to my knowledge he did very few houses uh this one being an exception we met John Rex through a an artist named Rico LeBron who uh was a very well-known artist in the 50s and 60s and my mother who was a painter studied with him and the LeBrons became very close friends he was like a second father to me and the rexes were good friends of theirs and that's how we got to know them when he designed this house he thought we were crazy building a nice house way out in the country by the time he was done he had bought property in the area built his own house and he and his wife lived there for many years I really can't say how the design came to be I was in school at the time uh when we were building this house I was in high school and away at school so I didn't have any input or knowledge of how this these decisions got made I suspect my mother had a great deal to do with it she was an artist and uh had strong ideas about how these things should be and so I'm guessing her influence was significant I helped briefly I had a summer job up here the summer of 1961 I believe it was I didn't get any of the fun work I got to work on the foundation and pouring a lot of concrete I did get to participate a little bit in the quarrying of the Granite for the side of the house as I mentioned that all came for about two 300 yards up the road from here and we literally dynamited it out of the Hills house is not terribly large it's about I want to say 22 2300 square ft the living room takes up probably 60% of the area of the house the interesting part of the design of this house is this module if you look at the ceiling you can see it's it's like a series of umbrellas that are tied together and uh each of those umbrellas is 14 feet square so that gives you an idea of the of the scale one of the interesting things and one of the things we're thankful for is the the vertical beams that are here 60 years have not warped or bent or anything that could have in any way compromised the design of the house this house has stayed amazingly intact we were incredibly lucky with the builder that we we got who built this house uh there really isn't anybody up in this area who could build a house like this man named Dean Farrar took the job turned out to be a meticulous man which is why a lot of the joinery that you see here worked otherwise it could have been a complete mess he was so meticulous that he realized that he really didn't want to be a contractor anymore when he finished the house and we actually hired him as the the manager of the ranch and uh he lived in a home which is the house that I live in now for a number of years before he retired the noteworthy Furniture in this house was designed by Sam malof who was a very fine woodworker very well known again of an era of this house Sam was a close family friend my mother after she stopped being a painter uh founded what became the craft and folkart museum in Los Angeles and one of the early exhibits was was Sam Malo with his furniture uh and when we moved up here it was the obvious choice and he designed the the dining room table that you see in here the side table a couple of the chairs and actually there was a few other pieces that are no longer in the house but that was the principal furniture that was in this house the ranch was originally purchased in 1959 and it was only about a third the size that it is now over the years as adjacent pieces of property became available they got Acquired and so now we have about the main Ranch is about 3,000 Acres but it's a working Ranch we have about 200 cows we raise Cales every year that we sell in the spring and as you drive around you can probably see some of them so that's the business of the ranch and that's been going pretty much since we got the place it evolved that way it wasn't at the very beginning my father's claim is he bought a ranch because his parents would never let him have a pony as a child this was his revenge but it was his passion and he was up here pretty religiously every other weekend the characteristics that I enjoy the most is the fact that it brings the outdoors in it feels like you're very much in the middle of the country here and it it changes with the seasons and it's a very comfortable place to be um where we're sitting right now is where everybody tends to congregate those are my best memories of it being up here with family and with my friends it's surprisingly faithful to the way it was when we first got it it's obviously certain things have been upgraded and changed but nothing that is visible uh the house is pretty much the way it was and U you know maintenance is what we mostly done the house right now since none of the family is using it is what on Airbnb we want people to come up who appreciate this kind of architecture who appreciate the furniture and really being out in the middle of nowhere you could be totally away from anything we're delighted to share it and uh especially with people who uh can be respectful and appreciative of what's in it and the work that's gone into it and the art that's in it I'm hoping the future of the ranch is something that my family continues to love and and wanted support at the moment you know I'm managing it I've taken it over from my father who died in 2016 my mother died uh in 1999 it was his place until he died I've tried to be a little more inclusive and I'm hoping one of my children or one of my sister's children are going to pick up the ball from me in a few years there will be an obvious point where it makes sense to pass it down I'm delighted to see that family members that come and love it I have grandchildren who can't wait to get up here and they were experiencing it the same way I did so I think it's going to stay in the family for a long time the structure of the ranch is a limited partnership now uh when my father got older he started gifting shares in this Ranch into this partnership so that before he died he had given all of his interest in it away 30 some odd family members who have an interest in the ranch and you know my only hope is that they use it and want to keep using it uh for as long as they want [Music] to

Channel: OPEN SPACE

Views: 355,306

Keywords: Mid century modern, mid century, modernism, john rex, open space series, architecture, ranch, north fork, sam maloof, woodwork, home tour, design, case study homes

Id: 0iFkm5L-CBw

Length: 10min 1sec (601 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 17 2024