Opinion: LACMA's newly inherited Sheats-Goldstein House could place classic mid-century houses at the heart of Los Angeles' cultural revival, says Mimi Zeiger.

Last month, LACMA announced that James Goldstein ? an eccentric personage familiar courtside at Lakers games ? had promised his iconic John Lautner?designed home to the museum. The gift, which includes $17 million (£12.1 million) for preservation and maintenance, was widely reported along with the well-known piece of pop cultural trivia, that the house was featured in a Coen brothers' film ? as summed up with one clickbait headline: The Porn House From The Big Lebowski Has Been Donated to a Museum.
Soon thereafter my social media feed was peppered with photographs of the Sheats-Goldstein House (aka Jackie Treehorn's house) ? both the gravity-defying concrete roof over the very-sexy living room, and of course, the architecturally pornographic, glass-on-glass corner hovering over the Los Angeles skyline. I had skipped LACMA's press event, however my own visits to the Bel Air house over the years had produced identical images. Lautner's design prepares you for and then propels you toward that intoxicating, smog-tinged horizon. #nofilter. Lautner's design prepares you for and then propels you toward that intoxicating, smog-tinged horizon
It's no wonder that the museum would so eagerly welcome the chance to use the residence to host public and donor events. The Instagrammable vista rounds out LACMA's roster of photo-fr...