27 thoughts on “California Residential Architecture: Garage first”

  2. M: Thanks for that. I hadn’t seen http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snout_house ; it was also interesting to read http://realtytimes.com/rtpages/20000526_snouthomes.htm where a city banned this design, on the grounds that the resulting houses “look down their noses at passersby, foster a mindset that turns inward, away from the street, at the expense of community spirit.”

    I saw very few people on the sidewalks in this neighborhood in California and people did not know their neighbors. I think one reason is that they drive straight into the house, opening the garage door with a remote, and walk from the closed garage into the house. So they never really have a chance to wave hello to a neighbor.

  3. I love these. Growing up in the suburbs, I was always amazed at how much of our houses was devoted to rooms for the cars, instead of letting the cars live outside and giving the humans some extra room.

  4. Nothing new here for a British Columbians in Canada.

    Only ultra rich houses have garage entrances on the side.

  5. I never thought this was an attractive look for a home. It’s obtrusive and uninviting.

    I had a conversation with a realtor about this. She explained this style of house came about as a result of people commuting further and further to their jobs. These houses were designed so the person coming home from a long commute can pull right into the garage and walk into the house.

    In New England, the modern colonial style homes are built up on a small hillock with a 2-car garage underneath. It’s an attractive style that leaves the front of the house looking like a traditional home while providing the convenience of parking in a garage integrated into the house without being the dominant feature.

    Example: http://p.rdcpix.com/v02/le1a38342-m0o.jpg

  6. Sent this to my mother who lives in suburban california, complete with a garage front and center.

    “I have thought about this. I never liked garage doors in the front of houses but it is convenient and alows for narrower lots. There is one housing tract in Bako that put in alleys and big front porches hoping to bring neighbors together in the front yards. It looks much better but is expensive. http://windermeresevenoaks.com”

    If you’re going to try to bring the American dream to everyone, you have to make it cheap.

  8. In my opinion, the most striking aspect of your photos show so many cars parked outside the garages rather than inside. No doubt those garages are full of enough useless junk there is no room for a car. I am always amazed people park their second most valuable possession, after a house, outside while keeping so much useless stuff not allowed in the house proper. Any bets on how many of those closed garage doors hide piles of boxes, old mattresses, and the offal from child rearing?

    Now for a pilot there is an option for the “ultimate snout home”. Garage on the front of the house with a gigantic hanger attached to the side really shows internal combustion needs overtaking all else!
    http://www.sandysairpark.com/

  9. There’s a perverse efficiency to these – most of what you see from the street is related to car storage and provides a noise and visibility buffer for the rest of the house…essentially hiding behind one’s cars which is a marketer’s dream.

  10. “I never thought this was an attractive look for a home. It’s obtrusive and uninviting.”

    Houses that are oversized to their lots aren’t really attractive either. They are more useful to their owners, though.

    The current trend/style is to focus on the interior of the house.

    The garage at the side requires a larger lot.

  11. They rarely use their garages for cars. Normally the garages are full of junk with the cars parked outside. Parents used the garage for 2 cars & junk with 1 car outside. Now they use the entire garage for junk while parking 2 cars outside.

  12. “These houses were designed so the person coming home from a long commute can pull right into the garage and walk into the house.”

    It really allows big houses to be placed on narrower lots. People seem to be more inclined to spend more on a larger house than a bigger piece of property.

  13. Junk in the garage. Who is to judge? Right now I’d love a garage, but I’d use it for storing toys(motorcycles, atvs, etc) and building boats. Big garages are great, but the cars can still live outside. If it was up to men I’m sure garages would be bigger than the houses.

  14. In my neighborhood of 40 year-old tract homes in Santa Barbara, Calfornia, the trend in the past two decades has been the conversion of these front-facing garages into rental units. So the extra cars and trucks have ended up being parked on the street. Needless to say, replacing the garage door with a solid blank wall or a few windows facing a bleak driveway makes for a dubious architectural statement.

    BTW, we converted our attached garage to additional living quarters, but removed the driveway leading to it and built a separate detached garage within which our vehicles and bikes are parked. With no cars in the driveway or outside our house on the street, we’ve been told repeated that people think there’s no one living here. Apparently cars really are the dominant life form, as Carl Sagan once said . . . at least in coastal California.

  15. My observations seem to agree with njkayaker’s: people wanted bigger houses with multiple-car garages without paying for a lot of land, so the lots shrank and became longer and narrower, with the shorter edge being parallel to the street. Driveways and garages also became more prominent when alleys disappeared, too.

    Along with the snout design, the “master planned”, covenant controlled communities built in the Denver suburbs starting in the 1980’s forbid cars from being left out in a driveway for more than a week, and larger vehicles (RV’s, boats, campers) are prohibited from anything more than temporary parking. Commercial vehicles are also forbidden from being parked overnight.

    Now that I live in the San Francisco Bay area, the tony town of Menlo Park takes the cake, where parking on the street overnight in a neighborhood zoned for single family homes is disallowed with some few exceptions (nightly permits can be acquired for guests, vehicle breakdowns, and other such circumstances). [source]

  16. I don’t think the “larger house on a smaller lot” is the complete answer. This style of housing is much less common in New England- even for the more “affordable” housing. I don’t think the lots here are significantly larger than the rest of the country. I think a big part of it is a matter of taste. A house in New England that doesn’t “look colonial”, or at least traditional, has an uphill battle when trying to sell.

  17. “I don’t think the “larger house on a smaller lot” is the complete answer. This style of housing is much less common in New England- even for the more “affordable” housing.”

    There might be regional differences.It’s possible that the difference you see in New England is related to zoning laws.

    Anyway, if the garages aren’t in front, then the property has to be big enough to run the driveway to the side of the house.

  18. In defense of California housing tastes, I would like to present http://www.socalmodern.com/index.php

    Some of the most beautiful modernist houses I have seen, exist in Southern California.

    Check them out and sigh with desire. Similar houses cost 2-3X here in bay area where I live. Now if only Southern California developed some real economy with real jobs so I could move there…

    -Ritesh

  19. “There might be regional differences.It’s possible that the difference you see in New England is related to zoning laws.

    Anyway, if the garages aren’t in front, then the property has to be big enough to run the driveway to the side of the house.”

    Sorry – my point was that large houses on a small lot don’t completely account for the garage in front architecture, though they may be a prime reason especially in certain parts of the country.

    I can assure you that most lots in New England are not larger than other places. The land here is too expensive. In situations where a larger house is desired on a smaller lot, the garage is placed in the basement, but it rarely is placed in front of the house.

  20. California? You need to get around more. This is how tract houses are built everywhere in new residential developments with small lots where you can’t devote a quarter of an acre to a concrete driveway.

    Typically you enter the house from the garage. The front door is for the occasional guest, and I suppose a perverse tradition (like Eastern houses that retain so many architectural anachronisms).

    There’s little opportunity to use the front door because these neighborhoods have no stores or facilities within walking distance, so the only way you leave or enter the property is in a car.

  21. “don’t completely account for the garage in front architecture, though they may be a prime reason especially ”

    I don’t think anybody is suggesting it is the “complete” answer. Being a “prime reason” is good enough for me.

    “I can assure you that most lots in New England are not larger than other places. The land here is too expensive. In situations where a larger house is desired on a smaller lot, the garage is placed in the basement, but it rarely is placed in front of the house.”

    The basement garage does save lot space but you still have to be able to drive into it. And you have to have have a sloped property. Older modest houses (early/mod 20th century) either put the small garage at the side of the house or in a separate structure in the back. These older homes were also much smaller than new homes being built now.

    Given that the “garage in front” design is rarely used in high-end homes (with sufficiently large property), I don’t think people prefer it. That is, that design is the trade-off made to have a really large house on a small piece of property (mostly!).

    One thing that is fairly unique about parts of New England is a very strong cultural/legal desire to make sure things look “New Englandy”.

  22. Actually it’s very handy. Loading or unloading the car is so simple because you can quickly exit or enter from the garage. Likewise, using the garage for storage is easier as well for the same reasons. It becomes another room in the house.

    Most new houses in the West are designed this way. I’m 54 years old and it’s not an uncommon sight to me at all. The “attached garage” was actually a feature we required when we were house shopping many years ago.

    As mentioned above, a long driveway to a garage in the rear is a waste of property. And, car insurance premiums in California are lower if you park in the garage.

    Don’t know how you extrapolate having a garage in the front to not waving hello to neighbors or “seeing very few people on the sidewalks”. What’s the assumption here? That we’re not on the sidewalk because we’re in our garage in the front of the house?

  23. JT: Regarding not waving hello to neighbors… if you consider that many people get home from work at approximately the same time, if everyone parks in a driveway or on the street and has to walk to the front door, there is a high probability that at some point during the week neighbors will be exiting their cars simultaneously and both be outdoors within earshot. If, on the other hand, people drive into the garage, use a remote control to close the door, and walk directly from the car into the house without ever setting foot outside, there is not much of a chance to see a neighbor without peering into their window or making an appointment.

  24. That would assume that we never leave our houses other than to go to and from work. The fact is, in my neighborhood at least, we have people taking morning and evening walks, walking their dogs, kids riding bikes, and folks washing those cars that get swallowed by our garages.

    People don’t get home at the same time anymore. So many folks are out of work, or work from their homes, or work flexible hours…like I do. I’m sometimes annoyed that it isn’t quieter here. There’s somebody outside all the time in my little, suburb.

  25. Come to think of it…there is a younger couple about 3 doors down the block who do exactly as you describe. I can’t remember ever speaking to them. So there is some truth to your theory.

  26. Thought this picture was a good addition to your study – it shows a comparison between a new rural California neighborhood and an established rural Midwest neighborhood:
    http://www.vintageflying.com/Quickstart/ImageLib/PICT2749_(Small).JPG
    http://www.vintageflying.com/Quickstart/ImageLib/PICT0523_(Small).JPG

    (Image is courtesy of the good people at Vintage Flying:
    http://www.vintageflying.com/page2.html

    Which has a lot of other pics that you might like documenting cross country trips in a Cub)

Comments are closed.