How the Iconic Dingbat Took Over Los Angeles

Describ­ing the “aggres­sive­ly eco­nom­i­cal” icon of mid-den­si­ty apart­ment known as ding­bats that pep­per Los Ange­les from the Val­ley to the East­side, Lau­ra Bliss writes that these build­ings “were a mul­ti­fam­i­ly answer to that sin­gle-fam­i­ly tem­plate.” These two- to three-sto­ry build­ings include a car­port on the bot­tom lev­el and gen­er­al­ly house six to 12 units. In the 1950s and 1960s, “[t]his new for­mat for afford­able mul­ti­fam­i­ly became near­ly as ubiq­ui­tous as the sin­gle-fam­i­ly tract hous­ing that iconi­fied the much-mythol­o­gized South­ern Cal­i­for­nia sub­ur­ban .”

Ding­bats pro­vid­ed “an resource for a city: Los Ange­les Coun­ty added more than three mil­lion res­i­dents between 1940 and 1960, thanks to job booms in man­u­fac­tur­ing and aero­space, edu­ca­tion­al oppor­tu­ni­ties for return­ing GIs, and the lure of year-round sun­shine.” Over 700,000 new units sprawled out­ward as new free­ways made the periph­ery more acces­si­ble and the city swal­lowed up cit­rus orchards and ranch­es.

Today, ding­bats, many of which are rent-sta­bi­lized, some ben­e­fits as “a bas­tion of rel­a­tive­ly afford­able shel­ter” in a city fac­ing a severe hous­ing short­age. “Ding­bats may also hold the pos­si­bil­i­ty for accom­mo­dat­ing fur­ther infill: Thanks to recent legal changes, it’s now to con­vert car­ports into acces­so­ry dwelling units, which some own­ers are begin­ning to do.” These build­ings exem­pli­fy the mid-cen­tu­ry’s answer to “miss­ing mid­dle hous­ing” and “tell a sto­ry of the city met the demands of the day a low-cost, replic­a­ble, yet indi­vid­u­al­ized hous­ing form fac­tor.”

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