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Leonard Lundgren and the Sellstrom house

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I wrote a column for Sunday’s American-Statesman about Ashley Amini’s fight to prevent the city from declaring a 1961 house she bought in June a historic landmark, but thought I’d add more details about the house and its architect here. Amini wants to tear down the house to build her own, but if the City Council declares the house a landmark, then she won’t be allowed to demolish it. Go here to read my colleague Sarah Coppola’s news story about the house and the city’s attempt to keep Amini from tearing it down.

And go here to read the Historic Landmark Commission’s application to have the house declared historic and to see several photos of the house.

Amini showed me the house last week and I’ve been by it three times. It has grown on me, but not to point where I think it’s such an outstanding example of midcentury modern design, as the landmark commission claims, that its loss justifies the city violating Amini’s property rights to declare it a historic landmark against her wishes. As I wrote in my column, another buyer with a great deal of patience and money could renovate the house into a midcentury modern gem, but that’s not what Amini wants to do and it’s her property now.

The house (pictured below) was designed in 1961 by Austin architect Leonard Lundgren for Albert Sellstrom, a University of Texas professor, now retired. The landmark commission’s application to have the house zoned historic calls the house “an excellent example of mid-century modern architecture, designed by Leonard Lundgren, a world-known Austin architect whose only residential designs are here in Austin.”

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Steve Sadowsky, the city’s historic preservation officer, has called Lundgren an “extremely significant” architect. Landmark Commissioner Terri Myers said during the commission’s meeting to discuss the Sellstrom house that Lundgren “was of considerable importance and influence.”

I asked Amini if she’d show me the Sellstrom house. I found the unique details that intrigued landmark commissioners — the triangular designs around the bottom of the balcony railing, the arched, coke-bottle windows in the stone wall, the arched doorway framed by the same coke-bottle glass — to be contrary to the best of midcentury modern design, which largely shunned ornamentation.

The commission’s zoning change review sheet describes the condition of the house as “excellent” but that description applies only if you look at the house as still largely existing in its original state. I would guess that not much has been done to the house since it was built — maybe a few minor upgrades in the 1970s but that’s about it. In other words, the house needs work. The balcony that extends off the living room over the garage needs to be repaired, if not replaced. The triangular shapes in the balcony railing (are they meant to evoke longhorns?) are made of plywood and a few are warped.


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