Mom's West Coast Architecture Tour: Part Two

Need to get caught up?  Here's Part One.

When last I blogged, we covered the first day of Mom's visit earlier this month and our excursion to the Stahl House in the Hollywood Hills.  Her second day with us, Sunday, found us mostly hanging around the house, working on random stuff (she unpacked and organized ALL of our books - not a small undertaking), although she and I did venture out to have tea at Elise's Tea House in our Bixby Knolls area of Long Beach, which was fantastic (seriously, of all the high tea's I've been to, and it's a lot, folks, this was the best food I've ever had at one.  I can't wait to go back).  

On Monday, we were up on the early side of things and heading toward Santa Monica and the coast to see the Getty Villa.  I've been to the Getty Museum before, on a visit to see Dad when I was growing up, and it's absolutely amazing.  However, since we only wanted to spend half a day or so in museum-type settings, we picked the Villa instead.  While entrance to the Villa is free, you do have to get tickets ahead of time via an online reservation, and it does cost $15 to park.  However, it was well worth it.  The setting right on the Pacific Coast Highway (the PCH) jut a few miles down from Malibu is stunning, and the Villa itself is insane (it's a recreation of a Villa destroyed when Mount Vesuvius erupted all those year ago).  Add in some legit Etruscan, Greek, and Roman art, and it's worth far more than $7.50 a person (and that's if there are only 2 people in the car, as we had - Chris had to work.  Lame for him).

From our house, it's about 25 miles to the Villa, which means 800 hours of travel time or so, but we did get to witness the very end of the 10 freeway as it dumps into Highway 1 near the Santa Monica Pier.

The next time I need a windshield replacement,
I need to look at this photo when
I'm asked if I have the black stuff near the mirror.

Obviously, the answer is yes.

On entering the Villa, you walk through the main entrance which leads you to an amphitheater where plays and the like are still performed.

It's all pretty impressive.

We first headed to the museum itself to watch the informative video about the Villa.  The Villa actually preceded the Museum, as this was where Mr. Getty, the oil tycoon, stored his earliest collected masterpieces.  Eventually, of course, the collection grew too large and most of it moved into the Museum.  However, there's still some rad stuff at the Villa...

Like this statue of Hercules!

(Hercules!  Hercules!  Sorry)

The details in this place are insane.  Check out these closeups of the floor pattern:

There was another room in the Villa,

filled to the brim with priceless statuary,
made to look like a small chapel room.
It was gorgeous.

The Hercules statue (technically, it's Heracles here, since it's Greek) is one of the more famous pieces of the collection, and it's one of the main draws.  To fit with this, there's a decent about of literature within the museum about Hercules and his many deeds of daring do, including this:

Nom, nom, human arms.
I like these people at the Villa.
They have my sense of humor.

While the antiquities inside the museum are priceless and amazing, the real draw of the Villa is its set of gardens.  There are quite a few both large and small, and they radiate outward from the museum building.  There's this little gem:

Which mainly features a pond and this fountain.
Those are some alarmed faces behind me.
They're worried about the Mares of Diomedes.
I freaking would be.

There's also a courtyard garden within the boundaries of the museum building.  The blank blue areas are normally where reflecting pools/fountains go, but due to the drought, all of the water features have been turned off for now.

That's essentially the back patio of the museum,
leading to yet another garden.
Yup, that's authentic Italian terrazzo tile.

After seeing all this, you walk out of the museum courtyard and into the main garden at the Villa:

The detail on the garden walls.
That's a cricket painted into the mural!

Someone should probably warn this guy
about the tree growing out of his head, non?

The Villa was also playing around with growing grapes...

Garden selfie!

In addition to these gardens, there's also an herb garden on the property, and we had fun wandering through there, seeing how many we could identify without the helpful placards:

I know this one!  Lavender!

By the time we'd strolled all of these gardens, we were ready for a break, so we stopped on the terrace to look back at the Pacific Ocean.

Enjoying the cool ocean breezes!

Even the driveway to the Villa is
paved with authentic Italian cobblestones.

After a quick stop at the gift shop (because of course), we said ciao! to the Villa and headed further north on the PCH.  We drove up through Malibu and grabbed lunch at a place called Moonshadows.  It was right on the water, and while our food was good, the real draw was the view (as it is with so many places in this area).

A northern view...

...and a southern one,
right from my seat at the table!

After lunch, we headed back south on the PCH and to our final stop for the day, the Eames house!  More details in the next blog!

Later!

Amy