Imagine this: It’s the beginning of the 1960s. You are a young aerospace engineer. Your father-in-law has given you a lot in the Santa Monica Mountains above Mulholland Drive, with a spectacular view and a 45 degree slope. You want to build a house there, but everybody tells you that this is impossible. Your budget is limited. What do you do?
Leonard Malin (who was the young man) found help in architect John Lautner. Lautner already had a reputation as the best architect for the most difficult building lots. I can just imagine those two getting together, with Mr. Malin stating: “I have the lot. I have $30.000. I want to live there. Do what you want. And, by the way, the end result does not need to look like a house.”
Okay, I made that last sentence up. But he could have said it, because the house, better known today under the name “Chemosphere,” looks like this:
Imagine living there. What fun.
I can just hear redneck sightseers “Look, maw, it’s one a them there space ships. The aleens is landed.”
No danger of any rednecks getting there. The Chemosphere is far away from Universal City and the Walk of Fame.