Garbutt House (Los Angeles, California)

 house, historic landmark

1809 Apex Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90026

Frank A. Garbutt, an inventor, industrialist and movie pioneer, was one of the most prominent citizens of Los Angeles in the late 19th and early 20th Century.

In 1923, Garbutt acquired a 37-acre hilltop site overlooking the Silver Lake reservoir with views of the Pacific Ocean, the Santa Monica and Verdugo Mountains and the downtown skyline. Garbutt and his family built three houses on the site, which came to be known as the Garbutt-Hathaway Estate.

Garbutt himself lived in the 20-room mansion built between 1926 and 1928 that came to be known as Garbutt House. The house has nearly 15,000 square feet of space, rises 228 feet to its crest and was built like a citadel out of concrete to survive earthquakes, floods and fires. His daughter Melodile later recalled that the entire first floor was poured in one pouring that took two days and one night of steady pouring with three shifts of workers.

Due to an intense fear of fire, Garbutt even had the roof and walls built of concrete, installed steel-reinforced doors and allowed no fireplaces in the home. A subsequent owner noted that the concrete construction was "comparable to any of the finest bunkers." The house also had bronze window frames, hand carved teak and marble floors. The first floor was entirely travertine, and Garbutt hired an artist who spent several months painting the beams in the living room.

Garbutt worked at his inventions at the Silver Lake mansion, building race cars, inventing a soapless detergent, and trying to invent a superior chewing gum.

After the estate was sold by one of the daughters in 1960, two of the houses were torn down in 1978 to make room for a 100-home development.

It is now the home of Dov Charney, the founder of American Apparel.