The Los Angeles Stake Center

The Los Angeles Stake Center By R. E. Caldwell GOING south and east about five miles from the center of Los Angeles, to Middleton Street near Zoe in Huntington Park, one arrives at the Los Angeles Stake Center, standing out from its harmonious environment — a feature to be remarked — a building and grounds of appealing beauty. The building is of the Spanish type of architecture, done in frame and stucco of a grayish buff with the slightest, though dis- cernible, tint of green. Its heavy red-tile roof and sturdy under- structure suggests the strength of its foundations and knits it ap- propriately to earth. Located on spacious grounds, the structure is in plan U-shaped, following approximately the perimeter of the property on three sides and enclosing within the U a patio of liberal proportions. Taken with the Huntington Park ward chapel, with which it is connected, under cover, by wide corridors and interesting stairways, it presents to the street a frontage of nearly three hundred feet. The facilities consist principally of a commodious vestibule, an expansive lounge, a large auditorium or social room, including stage or choir loft, classrooms and other rooms such as council cham- bers, club room, office, rest rooms and sundry conveniences for car- rying on the work of a stake of the Church in all its aspects. In all, twenty-five departments can be housed in separate rooms for private instruction or work. The Center is intended to be utilitarian first; but it is also said to be aesthetic in its modest appointments. The general require- ments are to furnish facilities for stake conferences, departmental work of the auxiliary organizations, accommodations for stake authorities, bishops' meetings, stake priesthood activities, genealog- ical work, social contacts, and entertainments. It has been variously called "Stake House," "Stake Hall," "Stake Auditorium," "Stake Home," and "Stake Center." The people of the neighborhood regard it as a "Mormon" edifice of semi-sacred nature which is worthy of all respect. Growing up about it are some of the finest of traditions emanating from religious and social contacts of the finer sort. A wall which divides the street from the patio gives to the whole premises a semi-privacy; and, at the same time, an atmos- phere of a dignified welcome to all respectful visitors has been

584 IMPROVEMENT ERA mv. iw achieved. In the center of the patio, where an attractive fountain is erected, are wide flagstone walks trimmed with bright-red brick with moss showing through the joints, lending fine color contrasts and a feeling of tradition transplanted. The fountain is of re- splendent vari-colored tile of blue, green, white, red, russet and purple. The colors and sheen of the tile are much heightened and en- hanced by the spray which plays perpetually over them and falls into a pool, fashioned for water plants and gold fish at the base. About the fountain are scores of varieties of flowering and other plants and shrubs. Six hundred fifty plants were furnished free and planted gratis by the lone hands of the donor. Interspersed among the flowering plants are palms, Italian cypress, cane clusters and banana plants, while hedges of box-wood, veronica and green privet furnish the borders. The entrance vestibule is floored with selected deep-red Spanish tile, slightly warped, bordered with highly ornamental Batchelder tile in brilliant hues with verdigris and red predominating in shaded contrast. The ceiling carries deep heavy beams decorated in con- ventional designs with rich but subdued colors and the three lu- nettes above the entrance doors are graced by murals of quality taken from Utah scenery and symbolizing the entrance of the Pioneers into Utah and the difficulties which beset their way on their long trek from the Mississippi to the Rockies. These murals do not arouse sympathy but are a challenge to strong, vigorous manhood. Rising by two steps, which extend across the vestibule, and passing between art stone columns joined by three arches, one enters the lounge. This room, besides being what its name implies, serves many purposes and is perhaps the most useful as well as the most ornamental room in the building. The mantel with its fireplace never escapes attention. With its heavy andirons, in Spanish, scrolled and wrought of hammered malleable metal, played upon by the cheer of a lively wood fire on a cool evening, it sends out a sensation of comfort and "all's-well- with-the- world" that can be felt by the least impressionable. Continuing through the lounge from the vestibule, the audito- rium or social hall is entered through draped openings fitted with three pair of double-acting doors. Here is a room fifty-four feet wide by one hundred twenty-eight feet long, twenty-eight feet of which is taken from the end lying apart from the lounge and fashioned into a combined and commodious stage and choir loft. Surrounding the auditorium is a wainscot of redwood boards on end, in random widths, set in a base and an appropriate mould at three and one-half feet from the floor. Above the wainscot, covering the walls and the open ceiling above the trusses, is an acous-

May, 1929 THE LOS ANGELES STAKE CENTER 585 tical plaster of rough and fibrous texture applied on the walls in a raised, irregular pattern, producing the effect of shimmering lines running from the wainscot to the square. The ceiling is lightly tinted in green and gold and the walls are in decided tone, merging from rather a dark brown into a bright burnt orange, sparingly sprayed with light mulberry. The wainscot is dark, with a glint of a rich reddish purple visible in a strong light by night or by day, and the decorative scheme culminates in the "Mormonesque," symbolized by the Beehive which occupies the central position on the truss chords. The stage is without the regular stage loft, hence no bats or cobwebs. In general the stage finish is in keeping with the main auditorium but contrasted on the walls of the stage by the use of a decidedly mulberry tint. Plum-colored front curtains of rich, soft velour, falling in deep folds from arch to floor and lightly decorated with burnt orange and soft blue-gray at the center and bottom edges, fall into the decoration scheme with pleasing accord. The north wing of the building is across the patio from the wing comprising the lounge and the vestibule and forms the remain- ing side of the U-plan. It is entered from the patio, from the audito- rium or from the ante-room of the stage into a communicating corridor. On the first floor of the north wing are classrooms, ladies' rest room, men's club room, closets and conveniences. On the second floor are the stake office, two stake presidency and high council chambers, classrooms, closets, etc. The classrooms are provided with blackboards and other classroom equipment. These rooms and the auditorium are furnished with portable seats. Those in the auditorium are of bronzed metal, and up- holstered to match in color. When fully seated, the regular rows of the good-looking chairs make a pleasing appearance and the dominating appeal in this room, when seated, is that of comfort and pleasant anticipation. The lighting installation comprises more than thirty thousand watts. The equipment is suited to respective locations, being or- namental, practical and durable, as service dictates. The street lights at the entrance are of the lantern type in grill metal work and amber glass and the vestibule is lighted by an ornamental piece elongated vertically with ornamental candle sockets behind clear glass. The lounge is profusely lighted with four chan- deliers in hammered wrought iron, augmented by mantel brackets of two lights each, four lamps under decoration shades and two table

586 IMPROVEMENT ERA May, 1929 lamps under colored shades on heavy antique pottery bases. Art screens of extra charm are grouped effectively with the light effects as fancy may suggest. The auditorium is lighted from fourteen heavy fixtures of flat drum type in heavy metal, bottomed under the light units with amber glass flooding the ornamental trusses and ceiling with strong light which indirectly fills the room with soft, mellow illumination. Through a rheostat and by means of an elaborately equipped panel, these lights, as well as the foot and border lights of the stage, are dimmed or brightened at whim. The choir loft is lighted secondarily from brackets set about the walls at an optimum height. The north wing is well lighted from fixtures of the useful sort. About the patio, on the building, are numerous bracket lights illuminating the flagstone walks. The fountain and whole patio with shrubs and flowers are bathed in mellow white light from two high-powered flood lights, playing from high on the corners of the two wings of the building. While the moon is not obsolete here, it is scarcely more romantic than this patio on the darkest night, when fully illumined, from bracket and flood lights, with the ver- anda open to the refreshing outdoors. "Observe good faith and justice toward all nations. Cultivate peace and harmony with all. Religion and morality enjoin this conduct. And can it be that good policy does not equally enjoin it? It will be worthy of a free, en- lightened, and at no distant period a great nation to give to mankind the mag- nanimous and too novel example of a people always guided by an exalted justice and benevolence. Who can doubt that in the course of time and things the fruit of such a plan would richly repay any temporary advantages which might be lost by a steady adherence to it? Can it be that Providence has not connected the permanent felicity of a nation with its virtue? The experiment, at least, is recommended by every sentiment which ennobles human nature. Alas! is it rendered impossible by its vices?" — George Washington. Let us never forget that the cultivation of the earth is the most important labor of man. Man may be civilized in some degree without great progress in manufactures and with little commerce with his distant neighbors. But without the cultivation of the earth, he is, in all countries, a savage. Until he gives up the chase, and fixes himself in some place, and seeks a living from the earth, he is a roaming barbarian. When tillage begins, other arts follow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of civilization. — Daniel Webster. There are few delights in any life so high and rare as the subtle and strong delight of sovereign art and poetry; there are none more pure and more sublime. To have read the greatest works of any great poet, to have beheld or heard the greatest works of any great painter, or musician, is a possession added to the best things of life. — Swinburne.