Architecture Series: Ranch
Like the dressing, Californians love it.
If you look past the cheese shot and set eyes on the background, you’ll see the catalyst for this post: a 1950s ranch-style home.
That’s me, my dad and my two younger brothers (photo credit to mom). My parents were the second owners of this home and lived with this architecture style for a decade before they remodeled. It was a house whose blue front door matched the color of the drainpipes, whose raised foundation constantly had my parents whisper shouting “walk softly, you’ll wake Thomas from his nap!” and whose shingled roof was unfortunately deemed a fire hazard. (A required roof replacement lead to said remodel.)
A ranch-style home was my first memorable hideout and, because of that, I would not be mad in the slightest if I ever live in one again. Chances are high that I could too, because southern California is the origin of this architecture style, beginning in the 1930s.
So what is Ranch? Yeehaw!
Some identifying features of this architecture style:
one story shape
low-pitched roof
front entry located off-center and sheltered under the main roof of the house
large picture window
asymmetrical facade
attached garage
private outdoor living spaces— large rear windows and back patios were a move away from the front porches once popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
sliding glass doors
slab foundation
For me, the neatest feature to find in my research was the common use of sliding glass doors. I have strong memories involving the smell of windex to keep these doors clean, while at the same time, visuals of us as kids taping up hand-drawn paper birds to save real birds from hitting the glass.
While the Ranch home I grew up in echoed as you walked through the home because of its masonry-pier foundation (hence why no one could get a peaceful nap), most ranch-style homes were actually built on then-inventive, rapid build era, concrete slab foundations. In addition to the one-story and low pitch roof visual, these slab foundations allowed ranch-style homes to get very close to the ground.
While the style began in the 1930s in southern California, Ranch homes’ popularity grew immensely during in the 1940s, 50s and 60s because of government influence, developer preferences and the suburban migration. For Uncle Sam’s part, Ranch homes were the only ‘small house types’ built under FHA financing guidelines during the 1940s.
Three and half million single family homes were built in California alone during this post-WWII era. And ranch-style homes were SO popular that estimates put 70% of homes built in the US from 1945-1970 were ranch-style homes.
What is the FHA?
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) was established by Congress in 1934 as part of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's New Deal to help the country recover from the Great Depression. The FHA's primary goals were to provide access to home mortgage credit for underserved homeowners, facilitate home financing, improve housing standards, and increase employment in the home construction industry.
Through the 1950s and 60s, the FHA continued to have influence on the construction of houses, very much favoring Ranch for suburban subdivisions in warm climate cities such as Atlanta, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles and Phoenix. While Ranch homes did (and do) exist in northern US cities, it wasn’t a popular choice because of land price and homeowners’ desires to save on heat. Split-level or two story homes worked better for this purpose.
In warm climates, developers went with ranch-style during the suburban boom because of how inexpensive it was to vary the appearance of similar house plans. It appears people generally wanted to avoid monotonous neighborhoods. How nice.
Most importantly, ranch-style homes worked perfectly with the rise of the automobile and the American suburb. For the first time in history, people had inexpensive and, what seemed like, never ending open land. The Ranch house showed off this luxury with it’s sprawling one-story-with-attached-garage-layout. The Ranch house was lavish and home buyers and home builders perpetuated this aesthetic and connotation for decades.
Famous ranch-style homes include Ronald Reagan’s ‘Rancho el Cielo’ in Santa Barbara. Or Jean Vandruff’s ranch-style ‘Cinderella’ Homes in places like Anaheim and the San Fernando Valley. It’s amazing to see similar architecture features take on different aesthetics— from the whimsical, adobe and ‘International Style’ (what we call mid-century modern today).
What an incredible piece of recent history! I’m proud to have lived in one of the 2.5 million single-family ranch-style homes built in California during the post-WWII era. This architectural style is truly woven into the fabric of California's identity.
Now, off to drench my pizza in some Ranch.
So interesting Lauren! I do love the ranch style but I didn’t know it’s history. There are so many beautiful ranch style homes near us in Palos Verdes.