Six Preservation Winners Named : L. A. Conservancy Recognizes Work on Historic Buildings

Six winners of the Los Angeles Conservancy’s Preservation Awards for 1985 have been announced.

The winners were selected for having demonstrated exceptional achievement in the preservation of historically significant buildings or sites or for a tangible and important contribution to historic preservation.

Awards recognized the Garfield Building, 403 West 8th St.; Elizabeth Bard Professional Center, 121 N. Fir St., Ventura; Gartz Court Relocation Project, 745 N. Pasadena Ave., Pasadena; the Storer House, 8161 Hollywood Blvd.; 34 E. Holly St., Pasadena, and Tom Owen, who is on the staff of the California History Room at the Central Library.

The Garfield Building was singled out for restoration and rehabilitation of a major commercial building in downtown Los Angeles; Elizabeth Bard Professional Center, for adaptive re-use and new construction; Gartz Court, for relocation of a bungalow court and rehabilitation of it for moderate-income housing.

The Storer House, for being “an outstanding example of residential restoration;” 34 E. Holly St., for being “a model of small-scale commercial restoration and rehabilitation,” and Tom Owen, for “outstanding contribution to architectural research.”

The Garfield Building, an important Art-Deco landmark built in 1929, was a project of Peter Beale and Jay Shocket with lobby restoration by Ron Reed and Charles Kober Associates as project architect; the Elizabeth Bard Professional Center, a Mission-Revival hospital built in 1902, was converted into contemporary offices by Thomas R. Lee, general partner, and Gartz Court was a joint venture of the city of Pasadena and Pasadena Heritage.

The Storer House, built by Frank Lloyd Wright in 1923, is owned by Joel Silver, who restored the badly dilapidated home with the help of Eric Wright, project architect and Wright’s grandson; 34 E. Holly St., a single-story masonry building in Old Town Pasadena, was restored by project architect Robert H. Taylor, and Tom Owen developed information resources for the Los Angeles-built environment. The Conservancy called him “an indispensable resource to cultural heritage research in Los Angeles.”

The selection committee included architect Scott Carde, chairman; Don Bowers, partner, Ratkovich, Bowers & Perez; Mel Green, principal, Melvyn Green & Associates; Robert S. Harris, dean, USC School of Architecture; Roger Holt, past chairman, California Heritage Task Force, and Ruthann Lehrer, executive director of the Conservancy.

The awards were presented Saturday at a meeting of the Conservancy at the Gilmore Adobe at Farmers Market.