The Hollywood Hills In Syracuse

One of my favorite films of all time is “Sunset Boulevard” from 1950.  It’s very much a story about relics.  At 50, Gloria Swanson plays a Silent Film star well beyond her prime.  She rides in a vintage limo and lives in an aging Spanish Mediterranean style manse like so many of the stars of the Golden Era of Film.  She meets and clings to a handsome young screenwriter to prove her viability and we watch as she descends into madness.  It’s brilliant.

I love everything about it; the character development, the humor,  the courage Swanson displayed to expose herself in a role like that.  And I really, really love the house.

The film portrays the estate as dreadfully obsolete. Indeed, the authentic interior decor adds to the depressing feel of the place.  From my small library of old architecture and design books from eBay I’ve concluded the architecture of the 1920s is, in my opinion, the most aesthetically pleasing of all time but the interiors of the same period are oddly among the worst.  Interior design was a new field back then and the rooms reflect it.  Every room seems ignorant of design principals we know today.  Furniture is puny and uncomfortable.  Wood is dark, drapes are uninspired, fabrics are heavy and rather than gather furniture in groups, it’s all pushed to the walls.  Coffee tables didn’t exist, for books, for drinks, for feet.  Occasionally you’d see an undersized and too tall end table moved to the front of a sofa with a straight back.  The table had a fussy cloth draped on the diagonal as if adding some fabric could soften this erect and stiff presentation.  It couldn’t.  And this was the living room, in the days before family rooms.  Where did families get comfortable after dinner back then?

Barrington Road, Syracuse, NY

This is what you see in character  Norma Desmond’s place.  But I look past it to see the bones and the craftsmanship.  I see quarry tile floors and massive wood trim.  I spot wrought iron embellishment and clay tile roofs which are marvelously bumpy and textured.  The stucco, the leaded glass windows, the proportion and scale.  It’s all so beautiful!

By the time Sunset Boulevard hit theaters, America was enjoying a new economic expansion.  World War II was behind us and times were good.  The soldiers were home. They were getting jobs, getting wives, building houses and starting the baby boom.  The wave of  new homebuilding featured tidy Cape Cods and ranches with picture windows and rec rooms in the basements which were paneled and lined with “built ins”; shelving and bars that were a part of the construction of the house. It is easy to see why, in 1950, a dreary old house from 1925 would have no appeal.

Which brings us to the Genesee Hills in Syracuse near the Dewitt line.  I love that neighborhood.

Exquisite detail like a tiny second-floor balcony

You can see 1925 and 1950 with nothing in between all on the same street. And while my love affair with 1920s residential architecture blinds me to the usefulness and purpose of 1950s ranches, there’s one street that could be mistaken for Hollywood if only there were some palm trees.  It’s Barrington Road.

Most of the hills off Gifford Parkway, across the street and just east of Nottingham High School feature the 1950s Capes and ranches that filled up every remaining plot of land when the population of Syracuse was at its zenith.

But there are clusters of modest Mediterranean homes that proudly stand out as the grande dames of the neighborhood.

Some of them need work and many are hidden by overgrown shrubbery, but I can only imagine how wonderful it was when these and a few brick colonials and tudors were the only homes in those hills and the trees were not nearly as large to cover them up and hide them.

Here's the Dick Van Dyke side of the street

The 300 block of Barrington Road is my favorite.  It’s where Sunset Boulevard meets the Dick Van Dyke Show; five unique and charming Mediterraneans with large yards, one after another on one side of the street, ranches snugly forming a snake on the other:  Syracuse before the stock market crash and the end of prosperity for awhile across the street from Syracuse’s finest decade, the 1950s.  It’s marvelous to take in.

Arches and stucco. Another 1920s gem in Syracuse

Clay tiles add texure and shadow to small angles of roofing

Surprisingly, the old clay tile roofs stand up to our punishing winters.  I’m sure they’re prohibitively expensive to use today, but they add so much.

Wrought-iron, petite balconies, rough-hewn corbels, stucco, clay tile. Lots of beauty in 1,700 square feet

And these are not large homes. According to zillow.com, the homes on Barrington Road are between 1,400 and 1,700 square feet.  There are master bedrooms in Manlius that are bigger than these entire  houses, but these houses offer taste, charm and history.

Take a ride there, or better yet, pull over and walk the hills, up Barrington to Demong and the other little streets that have one or two Spanish surprises in a sea of clapboard ranches.  The hills will give you exercise and there’ll be plenty to seee.  And if you’ve ever visited Hollywood, California as I have, tell me if it doesn’t remind you of the place, just a little bit.

Tagged as: 1920s architecture, homebuilding, Mediterranean style, Spanish architecture, Syracuse