...Architect to the Stars

Williams designed houses in some of the finest areas of Los Angeles, including Beverly Hills, Bel Air, Pacific Palisades, Hancock Park, Pasadena, and San Marino.  And these were the very neighborhoods in which he wouldn't have been allowed to live in at the time. 

“He went a long way toward defining what style was for Los Angeles.”

By the end of the ‘20s, Williams had established a reputation as "a skilled and sophisticated designer for the upper middle class and the wealthy".  Los Angeles was growing and the Hollywood area was full of newly rich talent who wanted to build nice homes.  There wasn't enough money in these small commissions for the  major architects around town, but Williams took them.  And because  of his keen sense of design and proportion, he broke the color barrier of his day.   Below are some of his designs for the stars of Hollywood.    He was on his way to becoming "...architect to the stars".   You may not remember the names of some of the original owners but these homes are still in great demand by the new generation of stars. 

Williams became a master of design, room arrangement, engineering, landscape, period architecture and more importantly, human behavior - the total package.  He was prolific and designs flowed from his drawing board for those elegant mansions, modest tract houses, apartments, hospitals, schools, hotels, churches, private clubs, public housing projects, department stores, funeral homes and even car dealerships.  Although he was renowned for masterful interpretations of the Georgian and Colonial American styles, he proved to be even more masterful at working in a diverse range of styles, moving effortlessly between period revivals and into sleek Modernist designs of the postwar era.

Paul's father, Chester Stanley Williams and his mother Lila lived in Memphis.  Chester worked at the old Peabody Hotel on Main Street, as either a waiter or a porter.  His brother Chester was born in Memphis.  The Williams family moved to Los Angeles in 1894 and Paul was born shortly afterwards.  Years later when Paul was becoming an established architect, he designed a Los Angeles home for actor-comedian Danny Thomas.  And when Danny began to dream of building St. Jude's in Memphis, he wanted Williams to design it - and Paul Williams did design it - at no charge.    The hospital was dedicated in 1962 during weeklong celebrations.  On the tenth anniversary of the hospital’s opening Paul R. Williams was honored at a gala dinner in Memphis for his contributions to the hospital.  The St. Jude Project had been one of his last public commissions.  He retired a few years later and died in 1980 at the age of 85.   

"The Paul R. Williams Project is a collaboration of individuals and organizations in which AIA Memphis and the University of Memphis are the core institutions. The project began in early 2006 as an initiative of the Memphis chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) in honor of the 150th anniversary of the AIA. The Memphis AIA 150 Committee developed two ideas, the first was a permanent downtown design center; the second was an exhibition or some form of public recognition of the life and work of Paul R. Williams (1894–1980), the first African American member of the AIA and the first to become a Fellow (FAIA).  The Paul R. Williams Project committee’s motivation was and is to help expand public knowledge about this American architect, whose extraordinary accomplishment was achieved against a background of pervasive racism in a particularly exclusionary profession."    www.paulrwilliamsproject.org

Paul Williams Residential Architecture

Paul Williams designed over 3,000 homes and they're scattered all over the Los Angeles area.   They are highly prized - not only because of their history but because of their very comfortable and well-designed style.  Williams was amazing in that he could design in all styles of architecture.   He designed homes that incorporated features of English Tudor, French Norman, Spanish Colonial, Italianate, Georgian, and Regency.   And he was a master at all of them. 

Paul Williams most famous commercial building is the Theme Building at Los Angeles International Airport.  He often worked with groups of architects to design some buildings and helped design the Los Angeles Federal Office Building, the Kenneth Hahn Hall of Administration and the Stanley Mosk Courthouse for the County of Los Angeles.   Williams was particularly noted for his designs of building interiors.  Frequently when a building was being renovated, he was much sought after to "re-design" the building.  He also designed government buildings in Mexico and Colombia.  In a career spanning 50 years and some 3,000 projects, Williams perfected a style at once elegant and relaxed, one that helped shape the California Southland when it was still emerging from the orange groves.