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SPACESHIP HOUSE WINDOWS
The architects also replaced the original thick framed windows with frameless glass. The gas company tile was replaced by random-cut slate, which could not be cut thin enough in 1960, despite Lautner's desire for such a finish. During restoration the architects added details that were unavailable 40 years before, as the technology simply did not exist. Preservation architect Frank Escher wrote the first book on Lautner a few years after moving to Los Angeles in 1988, and oversees the John Lautner Archives. The recent restoration, by Escher GuneWardena Architecture, won an award from the Los Angeles Conservancy. Since 1998, it has been the Los Angeles home of Benedikt Taschen, of the German publishing house Taschen, who has had the house restored the only current problem with the residence is the relatively high cost of maintenance. Because of its unique design it proved to be a difficult sell and sat on the market for most of its time as a rental property. īy 1997, the interior had become run down for over 10 years it had been rented out and used for parties and as a result the interior finishes had undergone major and anachronistic alteration. The pair were subsequently convicted and sentenced to life in prison. Richard Kuhn, was stabbed to death there in a robbery by his lover and another man. The Malins and their four children lived there until rising costs and the demise of the aerospace industry forced them to sell in 1972. (Lautner originally wanted to call the house Chapiteau.) In the end Malin paid US$80,000 in cash. Chem Seal provided the experimental coatings and resins to put the house together and inspired the name Chemosphere. The cost to build Chemosphere, US$140,000 (equivalent to $1.28 million in 2021), was subsidized partly by barter with two sponsoring companies, the Southern California Gas Company and the Chem Seal Corporation. The lot had been given to a young aerospace engineer by his father-in-law despite his own limited means, the engineer, Leonard Malin, was determined to live there. Smith, the first African American admitted to the National Society of Interior Designers. The original decoration was provided by John H. Chemosphere is bisected by a central, exposed brick wall with a fireplace, abutted by subdued seating, in the middle. Because of a concrete pedestal, almost 20 feet (6 m) in diameter, buried under the earth and supporting the column, the house has survived earthquakes and heavy rains. This innovative design was Lautner's solution to a site that, with a slope of 45 degrees, was thought to be practically unbuildable. Most distinctively, the house is perched atop a 5-foot-wide (1.5 m) concrete column nearly 30 feet (9 m) high. It is a one-story octagon with around 2,200 square feet (200 m 2) of living space. The building stands on the San Fernando Valley side of the Hollywood Hills, just off Mulholland Drive.