Carl Laemmle's Incredible Old Hollywood Estate

These days we know my uncle Carl Laemmle for starting Universal Studios, but he actually started from very humble beginnings. He was born in a small town in Germany, immigrated to the United States as a teenager, and worked his way up over the next 25 years or so. He worked all kinds of jobs in that time - at a drug store, and on a farm, he managed a clothing store, and finally at 40 years old he entered the movie business. At the start of the film industry, there wasn’t a huge amount of money in it. It wasn’t the classiest or most desirable of industries, and nobody had any idea if it would even last. I think if you went back in time and tried to explain what the industry’s become today … well I think people would think you were nuts.

Carl Laemmle immigrated from Germany as a teenager and didn’t enter the film industry until he was 40 years old.

But through the 19-teens, you suddenly had these pioneers of the industry - like Carl Laemmle, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, Charlie Chaplin, and Harold Lloyd - making movies, production companies, and studios, and suddenly they’re making more money than the bankers and business tycoons that came before them. And naturally, when you’re making money like that, you need a house to match. I’m so excited to share one particular home with you - my Uncle Carl Laemmle’s home: Dias Dorados.

Dias Dorados wasn’t built by Carl Laemmle himself, but actually predates Carl to another filmmaker named Thomas Ince. Thomas Ince was a producer, director, screenwriter, and actor. He was known as the “Father of the Western,” and he built one of the first film studios, which he called Inceville. Funny enough, before Carl started Universal Studios, while running his production company IMP (Independent Moving Pictures Company,) Thomas Ince actually worked for Carl Laemmle. Thomas coordinated productions, and then started directing where he discovered his love of westerns.

By 1921, Thomas Ince had made quite a name for himself in the industry, and it was time to build an estate worthy of his accomplishments. He purchased about 30 acres off of Benedict Canyon in Beverly Hills at a cost of $2500 per acre. It had views of the hills on one side, and you could see all the way out to the Pacific. The state was built by architect Roy Seldon Price, who was known for his Spanish revival work, and it featured incredible work throughout, including tile, wood carvings, balconies, and arches. The home was named Dias Dorados, or Golden Days, harkening the romantic, Spanish California history.

A glimpse of the gorgeous Carl Laemmle estate from an old postcard.

Dias Dorados was shaped kind of like an H with a wing at each end of a connecting main hall. In the main house, Dias Dorados contained 35 rooms, 10 bathrooms, and 11 fireplaces. In addition to the kitchen, living room, bedrooms, and servants’ quarters, it also had a library, a billiard room, a play room, a breakfast room, and a projection room. The projection room wasn’t your standard home theater - which would have been cool enough - but instead a reproduction of a pirate ship. It had sloping deck floors, a ladder, rig and sails, potholes, ocean saves painted on the walls, and a giant stained glass pirate by where the screen came down.

A Sunset Magazine article from July 1924 says the house “captures the austerity of the Missions,” but if I’m being honest, I don’t see much austerity. The same article speaks of a picturesque staircase, it shows a patio with gorgeous arched windows, flower boxes, wood trim, and a beautiful flagstone floor. Dias Dorados used arches for almost every door and window, inside and out. It had a pigeon tower, a bell-hung belfry, and grape arbors. The house’s floors were made of hand-wrought oak, some rooms had vaulted ceilings, and many of the rooms were quite large, including a spacious living room, dining room, and a library with stained glass windows and dust-proof bookshelves. Downstairs, you’ll find the laundry room, boiler rooms, servant’s quarters, and their own servants’ patio. And throughout the house there were several staircases inside and outside, including at least one secret staircase.

This picturesque Dias Dorados patio features arched windows, painted tiles, and wood carvings.

The grounds were huge! Dias Dorados had a garage, tennis courts, a barn and stables, a duck pond, a chicken ranch, a bowling green, an orange grove, an avocado orchard, a rose garden … the list goes on and on. Now let’s get to the swimming pool - another unbelievable feat. It was built like a pond, and came with its own private beach with sand. You could change in the private dressing rooms nearby, kick back on one fo the many lounge chairs, use the nearby gym equipment, or even take a rowboat out on the water!

Thomas Ince enjoyed this home with his family until his untimely death in 1924. His wife, Elinor, didn’t want to live in the house without her husband, so she sold it to Uncle Carl in February of 1927. Carl paid $650,000 for it. He renamed the estate Casa Grande del Monte, though it’s almost exclusively referred to as Dias Dorados today. His son Junior and his daughter Rosabelle both moved in with him. To celebrate his new home, Carl threw a party with more than 200 guests. He sent out invitations in Spanish to keep with the theme of the house, and the party included a giant buffet and a live orchestra.

Carl Laemmle loved Dias Dorados, and the home became the site of some of Hollywood’s biggest events.

The house became the site of some of Hollywood’s biggest events. It wasn’t uncommon to host a party with hundreds in attendance. You name them, they were probably there. Buster Keaton, Mary Philbin, Laura LaPlante, Harry Carey, Norman Kerry, Irving Thalberg, Ernst Lubitch, Sid Grauman, Lois Weber, William Wyler … I could go on forever. Mary Pickford held a charity event at the house, and Carl threw a party for the German Ambassador. Rosabelle had her wedding to Stanley Bergerman at Dias Dorados, and she’d regularly host Bridge and mahjong games. And of course, my family was often over visiting with Carl or playing at the house.

A few months ago, I was contact by a woman named Mary whose grandfather was caretaker of Dias Dorados. His name was Paul Carsten, and he made sure there grounds were taken care of for about 2 decades starting in the late 1920s. Paul was married with two children, and they all lived in a house on the estate. Mary’s mother used to play with Carl’s granddaughter Carol.

The Dias Dorados pool was designed like a pond, and was big enough to row a boat on! The girl on the front of the boat is my grandmother, Carlotta Laemmle.

It’s heartbreaking to share that in the 1950s Dias Dorados was torn down and sold off in pieces. Many homes now stand on the land that used to be Dias Dorados, and there are even a few streets that pass through.