Historic ‘House of Tomorrow’ demolished: Sad necessity or a system breakdown? | Opinion
It was supposed to represent the future — and all the promise it held.
As of this writing, about all that’s left is a naked foundation, a big, blue dumpster and plenty of memories.
Last week, Bert Smyser’s famed “House of Tomorrow” — the “Streamline Moderne” architectural gem he completed, using newfangled plywood, back in 1941 — officially came down. It took only a few days, which isn’t surprising considering the extensive water damage the property sustained over the years thanks to its less-than-ideal perch on the edge of Clark’s Creek, an area of the Puyallup Valley prone to yearly flooding.
Eighty-odd years ago, Smyser constructed his House of Tomorrow, producing a fascinating architectural oddity that looked like “the work of a guy with big dreams standing in the wake of the Great Depression, staring into the future with all the optimism that fueled the baby boom, the Jetsons and the version of 1950s America that’s now pop culture.” That’s how I put it in June 2023, at least, when I first wrote about the property and its notable designer, an eccentric visionary also responsible for designing Bob’s Java Jive and what’s now the Tacoma Soccer Center.
Back then the House of Tomorrow was still upright and intact, not far from the old Milroy Bridge at River Road, as it had been throughout my childhood. But it’s days were numbered, thanks to what’s formally known as the Clark’s Creek Property Acquisition Project, and more specifically, the property’s long history of flood-related insurance claims.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency provided grant funding to help Pierce County buy the House of Tomorrow and then tear it down, money the county eagerly spent with an eye toward preventing future financial losses.
According to Pierce County spokesperson Amanda Smith, Pierce County purchased the property in November 2023 for $474,000. As a condition of the deal, future development on the site will be prohibited.
Pierce County conducted public outreach prior to the demolition, Smith noted, including holding holding two open houses, producing a walk-through video and creating an archived portfolio of Smyser’s work.
Second Use, a Tacoma-based salvaging company, also rescued “numerous items” from the historic home before it was torn down, Smith added, diverting approximately 1,650 pounds from the waste stream as a result of a request for proposals the county issued earlier this year
Demolition work at the property began Monday, April 15, and the House of Tomorrow was leveled on Wednesday, April 17, Smith confirmed.
Necessity or system failure?
When I drove by Friday morning, the House of Tomorrow was gone. A small backhoe remained at the freshly barren lot, presumably left to contend with a small pile of mangled debris, but the rest — as they say — was (and is) history.
In the eyes of some, like Pierce County civil engineer Randy Brake, who was tasked with the Clark’s Creek Property Acquisition Project, the House of Tomorrow’s demolition represents an unfortunate necessity. Given the undeniables, like the condition of the property and the likelihood of future flooding, razing Smyser’s dream home was the county’s only viable option, Brake told The News Tribune last year.
“The home is not located in a good location because of the flood hazard risks,” Brake said at the time, “and that flooding trend is not getting better.”
Others, like local historic preservationist Michael Sullivan, have never been so certain.
A day after the House of Tomorrow met its ultimate demise, Sullivan said he had yet to visit the Puyallup-area property, and that doing so will be painful.
Sullivan believes the House of Tomorrow could have been relocated, and should have been, considering a 2018 feasibility study recommended moving the home to a safe location.
Mostly, though, Sullivan sounded resigned to the loss of yet another small piece of Pierce County’s history.
He’s seen it before, and it never gets any easier, he told The News Tribune.
As cities across Pierce County contend with a critical shortage of affordable housing, including in Tacoma, Sullivan is more concerned about the political push for what he calls “replacement strategy,” which he described as an approach rooted in the belief that “the solution to all of it is new construction, and anything in the way just needs to be out of the way.”
For now, Sullivan is left to mourn.
It’s a feeling he’s grown accustomed to, he indicated, even if it stings every time.
“It’s a breakdown of a system that we should have in place to prevent these kinds of things from happening,” Sullivan said of the demolition of Smyser’s House of Tomorrow last week.
“I knew it was going to happen,” Sullivan acknowledged.
“I just haven’t had the heart to drive by yet.”
This story was originally published April 22, 2024 at 5:00 AM.
