News of the Arroyo
Title: | Historic home denied new site |
Subtitle: | |
Date: | 2006-07-22 |
Summary: | July 22, 2006 - Is there room for a historic home on the western slope of the Arroyo at San Rafael and Colorado? No says a city planning official. |
Author: | Gary Scott, Staff Writer |
Publication: | Pasadena Star News |
Content: | PASADENA - A city planning official has denied a prominent Pasadena couple a permit to move the historic Morris Landau House onto a lot at the western edge of the Arroyo Seco, ruling the home is simply too large for the property. The owners of the house, Ann-Marie Villicana, a former Pasadena councilwoman, and her husband, Robin Salzer, owner of a popular east Pasadena restaurant, immediately appealed the decision to a committee of the city\'s Planning Commission. Whatever happens there, the matter is expected to eventually end up in front of the City Council. Villicana and Salzer expressed disappointment, but not surprise, at losing out on the permit. They are hoping for a more sympathetic hearing next time around - and a little more flexibility than the city so far has been willing to show. \"Rules are rules, but there are always exceptions to the rules,\" Salzer said, who owns Robin\'s Wood Fire BBQ. \"The problem,\" he said, \"is there is a great fear with Pasadena Heritage and the West Pasadena Residents Association that this one project will release a cottage industry of historic homes\" being trucked into west Pasadena neighborhoods. In past years, these two groups may well have been the couple\'s biggest supporters, helping to sway the city to bend the rules for a project of such historical significance. But some residents have lost patience with the massive mansions that have taken perch atop once pristine ridge lines and have put increasing pressure on the city to take a hard line against any efforts to skirt strict development rules. Sue Mossman, executive director of Pasadena Heritage, said the project has many merits from a preservation standpoint, but her organization ultimately decided to oppose the permit for what she called \"the greater good.\" She is referring to the two-year-old hillside ordinance, a local law that restricts how large a house can be built based on the lot size and slope. Under its provisions, the Morris Landau House is too big. \"The hillside ordinance has been hard-fought, hard-won and consistently challenged by developers asking to exceed its provisions,\" Mossman said. \"The house is not a Pasadena historic resource,\" she said, \"it is not one of our own.\" Paul R. Williams, a prominent black architect, designed the English country-style Morris Landau House for a South African merchant of the same name. Built in the exclusive Holmby Hills area of Los Angeles, the house was later incorporated into the campus of the elite Harvard-Westlake prep school. The school decided to move the house to make way for a campus-wide expansion. Villicana and Salzer bought it for $1 with the idea of relocating it to a piece of land at the corner of Colorado Boulevard and San Rafael Avenue, which is next door to her parents\' home. On Thursday, a day after losing the permit decision, Salzer and Villicana came out to walk the property, which offers expansive views of the Arroyo Seco and the Colorado Street Bridge. \"Nobody is going to see it,\" Salzer said, noting the building pad is cut into the hillside, shielding it from neighbors on both sides of the arroyo. \"It won\'t have any impact on anybody but a rule.\" At present, the Morris Landau House is homeless. It has been cut into 20 or so pieces and trucked to a storage yard near Santa Clarita. \"It really deserves an exception,\" Salzer said. \"And if it sounds like I\'m pleading, I am.\" gary.scott@sgvn.com (626) 578-6300, EXT. 4458 |
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