California Craftsman Cottages of Laguna Beach

There was a time when you didn't have to be a millionaire to have a place at the beach. There was a time when you could get a cottage at a place like Laguna Beach for $1500. And while people made less money then, this was a fraction of an annual salary not a multiple of it. Since that time is rapidly fading, a little nostalgia is in order.

California Craftsman

By the second decade of this century there were several hundred people who called Laguna Beach home for some part of the year. Many of them had built the basic California bungalow-a small, single story, often one room, board and batten building that was used in the summer. In many ways it was the next step up from a tent. (Paintings from the end of the last century show that pitching a tent at the beach was common. At a time when roads were too bad and automobiles were too primitive to just hop over to the beach for the day, it was apparently common to pitch a tent and stay for a few days, a few weeks or even a whole summer.)

But some of the early pioneers built more substantial houses. One type of construction borrowed heavily from a style called Craftsman and came to be called California Craftsman.

In the second half of the 19th century, the Arts and Crafts movement started in England as a reaction to the machine age. Its adherents emphasized simple, hand made art that was an expression of the pre-industrial craftsman.

There was also a part of this movement which applied these principles to the building of homes. These were called craftsman homes. In England, these cottages were handbuilt as was everything in them. Since part of the craftsman ideal was to create art that was a continuation of the simple, hand worked materials of the workmen of the pre-machine age, it was something of a disappointment that all the hand worked material meant that only the rich could afford such homes.

In America, the craftsman ideal accepted the concept that the major structural parts of the home were made by machine but the finished areas and the design parts were to be simple and hand done. This made for a more affordable building.

Charles and Henry Greene of Pasadena were the source and inspiration of the California craftsman ideal in California and their firm created the models and examples for so many of the builders in Laguna Beach.

The Cottage Restaurant

Built in 1914 as a home by one of Laguna Beach's prominent pioneer citizens, Joe Skidmore, The Cottage Restaurant is not just one of the best examples of the California Craftsman style, as a restaurant it is certainly one of the most accessible.

It was used as a private residence until 1938 when it became the Laguna Vista Cafe. This lasted until WWII brought a dip in tourism and it reverted to a residence. In 1957 it became the Pancake Cottage and in 1964 it opened as The Cottage Restaurant.

With the change of name and ownership in 1964, several of the original appointments were found and replaced. These included the original oak doors and the colored leaded glass sideboard doors. Table lamps originally made for the Del Coronado Hotel in San Diego at the turn of the century were discovered in an antique shop and now grace the Cottage Restaurant.

The large porch or veranda was meant to allow the owner to sit out front and enjoy the beach air and is in keeping with the craftsman tradition of harmony with the surroundings. In the Cottage Restaurant the porch has been enclosed and is the waiting area for the restaurant.

(And what a waiting area it is! At the far end is a magnificent wooden ship model. The 17th century Royal Katherine is almost three feet long and features the best craftsmanship this writer has seen outside of a museum. Around the top of the walls there is a collection of photographs of Eiler Larson, Laguna Beach's famous greeter, in a variety of theatrical poses which will certainly be in a museum one day.)

The single story architecture is in keeping with both the beach cottage and the craftsman traditions. While exterior walls covered in shingles is not a requirement of a craftsman home, many do use this treatment rather than board and batten and it is certainly in keeping with the craftsman ideal of the natural vs. the machine made.

The interior of the building has been extensively remodeled to accommodate a restaurant but one can still get the feel of the original. What must have been the original living room has the cozy fireplace and what looks like the original glass in the windows. The antiques also help in getting the feel of the first part of this century.

One of the interesting features of the cottage is the peaked roofs and curved fascia. This oriental touch (buildings in Japan and China avoid straight lines on the roofs to thwart demons and/or negative energy) appears to have been unique to this building.