Hollyhock House is Wright’s first Los Angeles project. Built between 1919 and 1923, it represents his earliest effort to develop a regionally appropriate style of architecture for Southern California. Wright himself referred to it as California Romanza, using the musical term meaning “freedom to make one’s own form”.
Selecting a thirty-six acre site known as Olive Hill, client and architect worked together to develop a plan that included a home for Barnsdall and her young daughter, two secondary residences, a theater, a director’s house, a dormitory for actors, studios for artists, shops and a motion picture cinema. Because of financial and artistic differences, only the two secondary residences and the Barnsdall home, Hollyhock House, were built.
The House takes its name from the favorite flower of Aline Barnsdall. At her request hollyhocks were incorporated into the decorative program of the house and stylized representations of the flower may be found on the roofline, wall, columns, planters and furniture.
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