Docent
Educator
Resources
Acuity Sign-Ups
Docents are asked to sign up for at least one shift every 2 months, with a minimum commitment of 4 shifts a year from March 15, 2024—March 1, 2025.
Docent shifts are available Wednesdays—Sundays, with morning shifts from 11am-2pm and afternoon shifts from 2pm-5pm.
Once you sign up, you will receive email reminders of your upcoming shift. You can change or cancel your docent shifts via the Acuity email reminders. Please cancel no later than 48 hours of your scheduled shift. If you have a last minute cancellation, please email MAK Center’s staff at office@makcenter.org to let them know.
Docent Shadow Opportunities
T.K. McClintock
Thursday, February 20, 2025
11:00 AM — 2:00 PM
T.K. McClintock
Thursday, February 27, 2025
11:00 AM — 2:00 PM
Upcoming Docent Educator Events
Check back soon for more events!
Resources
Docent Educator Forum
This is a shared space to ask questions, share knowledge and connect with other MAK Center Docent Educators. Please add your name when you ask or answer questions and always cite your sources.
Schindler Lab
This publication documents an exhibition-oriented initiative that prompts artists and architects to develop installations highlighting Rudolph M. Schindler’s domestic experiment. Edited by Anthony Carfello, Sara Daleiden, and Kimberli Meyer.
Centennial
Exhibition Guide
The exhibition guide to centennial exhibition Schindler House: 100 Years in the Making features thematic essays and historical highlights by MAK Center Director Jia Yi Gu with architectural historians Sarah Hearne and Gary Riichirō Fox.
Readings
Written reflections from Robert Sweeney, the president of the Friends of Schindler House, about restoration work between 1981 and 2001. He covers the garden, kitchen, and bathrooms.
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Sweeney, Robert, “Kings Road House Restoration, 1981-2001”
Concrete construction is thematic in Schindler works of the early 1920s where light wood framing plays a secondary role. The 1930s brought a major shift in Schindler’s material approach as he started building with stucco cladding over wood framing.
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Mannell, Steve. “Schindler Frame: Method and Substance." In ACSA-CIB Technology Conference: Technology in Transition - Mastering the Impacts, 1999. 176-181.
A comprehensive overview of the pivotal Modernist architect R.M. Schindler, focusing on Schindler’s original approach, which he dubbed ‘space architecture’, influenced by the ideas of Loos, Wagner, and Wright.
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Sheine, Judith. “The Early Years of Concrete and Radicalism.” In R.M. Schindler, 105-114. New York: Phaidon Press, 2001.
Sheine, Judith, and Robert Sweeney. “Bold and Novel Construction” and “The Most Impractical House in the World.” In Schindler, Kings Road, and Southern California Modernism, 14-28. Berkley: University of California Press, 2012.
Schindler described the house as “beginning of a building system which a highly developed technical science will permit in the future. Each material will take its place openly in the structure, fulfilling all architectural and structural requirements of its place in the organic fabric of the building.”
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Smith, Kathryn. “Schindler House, 1921-22.” In Schindler House, 7-43. Los Angeles: Hennessey & Ingalls, 2010.
Kathryn Smith, a noted architectural historian, has written and lectured extensively on both Frank Lloyd Wright and Rudolph Schindler. She is a founding board member of Friends of the Schindler House, chaired the Schindler Centennial in 1987, and is also the author of Abrams' Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin and Taliesin West.
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Online Videos
Schindler House Restoration Tour, 1986
SCI-Arc Channel Archives
01:18:58
A survey of the first stage of restoration work at the Schindler House on Kings Road in 1986. In the video, workers are demolishing later additions to get closer to the 1922 form. Robert Sweeney, Director of Friends of the Schindler House and supervisor of the restoration, describes the work underway to restore the floors and the roof patio to their original state. Sweeney takes Mark Schindler, the son of Rudolph and Pauline, and architecture historian Kathryn Smith on a tour of the house, explaining the demolition work under way. Workers uncover a commemorative inscription, and remove substantial parts of the roof patio.
Interview with Clyde Chace and Ann Harriet, 1986
SCI-Arc Channel Archives
36:03
Video featuring Robert Sweeney and Kathryn Smith as they interview Clyde Chace and Ann Harriett, original residents of the Schindler House. The house by Schindler on Kings Road was built for two families: the Schindlers and the Chaces. Clyde Chace worked with Schindler as a contractor on his earliest buildings, 1923-24. Ann Harriett was Chace’s daughter, and lived at Kings Road. The first part of the discussion takes place inside, then on the roof patio, and then back inside while reviewing various publications about Schindler.
Shop
Active Docent-Educators (those who have given a tour in the recent 2 months) receive a 10% discount at the MAK Bookstore. Titles can be purchased in person at the Schindler House or online for pick-up.
FEATURED TITLES
