Friday, March 4, 2011

A Maverick's Country House

William Randolph Hearst, shown at age 31 in an 1894 portrait by Orrin Peck, built a still-mighty publishing empire and lived lavishly on a grand scale.  He was an art collector who personally selected and placed every object in his vast collection at the magnificent castle La Costa Enchanted (The Enchanted Hill), San Simeon, California, on the Pacific coast half-way between Los Angeles and San Francisco.  Working for 28 years with Julia Morgan, the first female architect to achieve national prominence, Hearst created a hybrid of informal California traditions infused with English country house sensibilities.  With actress Marion Davies as hostess, media mogul Hearst famously entertained the Hollywood in-set, such Charlie Chaplin and Gary Grant, mixed with the likes of Calvin Coolidge and Bernard Shaw for weekend house parties.
Guests usually arrived by train to the village that consisted mainly of warehouses for Hearst's treasures, the buildings often mistaken for the remnants of a historic colonial mission.  The five mile drive up to The Enchanted Hill complex winds upward giving occassional glimpses of the picturesque massing, disappearing again and again before dramatically arrive at Casa Grande, a castle-like main house with twin towers modeled after the Cathedral at Ronda, Spain.
Hearst had camped and picnicked on the 1,600 foot high hill as a child and continued that tradition until he decided it was time to give up the village of tents for a more permanent building.  There is some question as to whether it was Hearst or Morgan who came up with the idea of utilizing the Spanish colonial style, but clearly both embraced it completely.
The main entrance of Casa Grande combines contemporary limestone and cast stone with historic sculptural fragments.  The statue of "Galatea" by Leopoldo Ansiglioni in the fishpond is just one of many placed around the complex.
An early 1920s sketch by Julia Morgan for the rear of Casa Grande is similar to what was eventually built.
Just as architecturally significant and as fabulously furnished, there are three guest houses, pictured above:  Casa del Mar (House of the Sea), Casa del Monte (House of the Mountain), and Casa del Sol (House of the Sun).  There are two swimming pools.  The outdoor Neptune Pool is the most fantastic one could ever imagine.
Until you saw the indoor pool, located in the separate athletic building, that gives the effect of being in a classical aquarium because of the shimmering mosaic glass tiles.  This view below shows the diving balcony and the more shallow wading alcove beyond.
All the photos shown here are by Curtis Bruce and appear in the wonderfully informative book Hearst Castle, San Simeon with text by Thomas R. Aidala, published by Hudson Hills Press, 1981.  Additional photos, including some shots of the interior, taken by a fellow blogger and reproduced by permission of Hearst Castle, were published in a recent series of posts in the ArchitectDesign blog, at http://architectdesign.blogspot.com/.

As a fan of the Orson Welles' Citizen Kane, an unfair but fictionalized portrayal of Hearst that is none-the-less an incredible film, I thoroughly enjoyed visiting the estate some years ago with architect and film buff Emiliano F. Castro.  It is a state park and there are guided tours of the main house and the mini-mansion guest houses.
Victoria Kastner, the historian at Hearst Castle for 30 years, will present "A Maverick's Country House:  William Randolph Hearst at San Simeon" at the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, Saturday, March 12, 2011, at 2 pm.  There is no charge for the talk with museum admission.  The Devoted Classicist is the President of Decorative Arts Trust which is co-sponsor of the event with The Royal Oak Foundation, so it is hoped that blog readers in the area will be able to attend.

17 comments:

  1. the whole RH history is fascinating.
    thanks

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  2. It truly is such a magical place, due in part to the location but also to the genius of Morgan and Hearst. I encourage everyone to visit!

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  3. Sounds like a wonderful event - too bad I'm not closer. And what an incredible architectural feat - I've enjoying reading about over at Stefan's as well!!

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  4. WOW. I simply must visit someday. Those pools---and everything else. Utterly amazing .
    Lynn from Decor Arts Now

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  5. Thanks for the introduction to the Decorative Arts Trust and The Royal Oak Foundation.

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  6. good lord what a great blog you write!

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  7. the school where i worked in wales was located in hearst's welsh castle. he owned it for about 20 years, did a ton of work expanding it using rooms and towers from other buildings, but only visited a handful of times.

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  8. Renee, the Hearst story, including the other residences, is indeed an interesting one.

    ArchitectDesign, it was a wonderful collaboration, despite their occasional problems, between Hearst and Morgan, wasn't it?

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  9. Terry, more information will follow on Decorative Arts Trust in future posts. I joined The Royal Oak Foundation years ago as it was a requirement in attending the Attingham Summer School; one of the benefits of membership is free admission to British National Trust properties, but they also have wonderful speakers on occassion in major cities in the U.S.

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  10. Soodie, I am still growing into my blog but there is a lot I want to say, as long as there are visitors interested in reading about it. There are a lot of bloggers who post nice pictures but nothing is said about them, where the photos are from, or who was responsible for them; what is the point (except to sell advertising)? I enjoy the posts with a little blogger personality, so I hope to build on that for this site.

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  11. Meg, I think even Hearst himself did not know all that he had. I have had several clients who have bought from his collection of crates that had never been opened after his purchase.

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  12. Quintessence and Decorartsnow, your comments were bouncing around in blogospace for a while before reaching me. For reasons I have yet to determine, that happens sometime on both giving and receiving comments. But your readership us appreciated.

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  13. I have yet to visit, but I'm even more anxious to do so thanks to you and Stefan.

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  14. TPoC, you would love it. There are fabulous antique textiles and even the preserved fabrics bought as new are now interesting documents.

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  15. What an informative post - thank you, John. Talk about grandeur on a large scale!

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  16. Julia Morgan,where would RH have been without her? It had to take a blessed Saint to sort it all out. I can not help but think of the people Hearst ruined through his own ruthlessness-yellow journalism and hardly think Orson Welles missed the mark in roasting him in any way-though a drama it was. He had it all it would seem but his tactics for success loathe him for admiration. Isn't that a fascinating and ongoing topic to persue?

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  17. J'adore le dernier paysage , avec la mer au fond , sublime ! EB

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