Fred Sahadi's Most Important Collaborators at Fleur du Lac
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After getting his project plans approved at break-neck speed, Sahadi settled into the difficult task of recruiting the team of artisans and professionals he needed to turn his ideas into reality. We will profile Sahadi’s most important collaborators below:
Earl Hagadorn: Sahadi has been clear in stating many times in our interviews that the person he could not have completed Fleur du Lac without was Earl Hagadorn. Born in El Paso, Texas, infant Earl Hagadorn moved with his family to California in 1932. Earl entered Stanford University in 1950, and after serving in Korea, returned home to graduate with a degree in Civil Engineering in 1957. Earl and his wife Louise moved to Lake Tahoe in 1965 where Earl established the Professional Engineering firm of Grimm/Hagadorn, Inc. Earl’s first work at Fleur du Lac was in 1968 when he helped new owner James Viso improve the drainage of the Blackwood Creek distributaries that periodically flooded the estate grounds. His design for the culvert along Grand Avenue protects the property to this day.
When Viso finally tired of fighting CTRPA over his development plans and sold Fleur du Lac to Fred Sahadi in 1979, one of the first decisions Sahadi made was to hire Earl to be the project engineer for Sahadi’s plan to re-invent Fleur du Lac. Earl’s first projects at the estate were to shepherd the site design he created with Sahadi through the necessary approvals, then begin work on the beautiful perimeter wall and further drainage improvements. Throughout the design and construction at Fleur du Lac, Earl was Sahadi’s right-hand man, reviewing and signing all construction documents and acting as the project’s liaison with the myriad Tahoe Basin regulatory agencies.
Sahadi’s feelings for Earl Hagadorn are very warm and deep. Sahadi has said: “If there was a superstar of the new Fleur du Lac project it was Earl Hagadorn; I could not have done it without him. Earl not only worked on Fleur du Lac, but on my other projects including Cardiff Stud Farm, Barretts Equine Sales, and my Bay Area office buildings. Earl was honest, disciplined, and his work ethics were above reproach; he never let me down once. Earl was a close friend; I loved Earl”.
Earl and his wife Louise lived at Fleur du Lac in the Wild Canary Cottage, and later in Aspen Cottage when Wild Canary became the project office and sales center. They later retired to Sacramento, where Louise died in 2015. Earl continued to visit his most important professional project on an occasional basis and was honored to be the Grand Marshal of the annual Fleur du Lac Fourth of July Parade in 2019. The man we knew as “The Earl of Fleur du Lac” passed away on August 23, 2019.
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Kalef Alaton: Sahadi’s intent was to create world class homes that would be sold fully furnished and decorated. Because his personal design vision was completely incongruent with any designers he could have retained in the Tahoe Basin at the time, Sahadi turned to a friend working on upper-end homes in Los Angeles to be his design partner at Fleur du Lac.
Born on May 14, 1940 in Turkey, Kalef Alaton’s early life-plan was to become an artist. While studying in Paris at age 16, he changed his emphasis to interior design and apprenticed with famous Russian designer Oscar Mourinsky. After establishing himself in the designer community in Paris, he moved to New York briefly, then on to California where he lived in a mansion in North Hollywood and practiced primarily in Los Angeles. Alaton designed homes for Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra and other stars in West Hollywood and Beverly Hills.
One thing that set Alaton apart from his colleagues was his insistence on having a close working relationship with his clients. Perhaps this trait was what attracted Sahadi, because Sahadi was quite clear that he wanted a world class decorator to interpret his vision, not to create one of his own. Alaton was no doubt attracted to Sahadi by the unlimited budget for the project and by the fact that Alaton was encouraged to scour Europe to find artwork and decorative items. Although Sahadi did use a second renowned designer of Fleur du Lac, Jack Lowrance, it was clear that Alaton became Sahadi’s alter ego at Fleur du Lac. Sahadi called Alaton a “genius and a great friend.” Alaton died shortly after finishing his work at Fleur du Lac on May 15, 1989.
Alaton was recognized posthumously as one of the top 20 designers of all time by Architectural Digest in 2010, admitted into the Interior Hall of Fame in 2014, and named again as one of the top 25 interior decorators of all time by Architectural Digest Magazine in 2019.
Rick Guidice: Rick Guidice was a brilliant line-drawing artist. It was his job to take sketches and descriptions from Sahadi and translate them into line drawings, floor plans and elevations. Guidice did hundreds of such drawings, testing Sahadi’s ideas of how to translate a combination of European chateaux architecture and Kaiser era Tahoe vernacular architecture into beautiful buildings that could actually be constructed at Lake Tahoe in the 1980’s. It was no small task. We are fortunate to have a treasure trove of Guidice’s work in the Fleur du Lac archives.
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Nick Kromaydis: A San Diego native, Kromaydis and his family visited Tahoe Swiss Village, a short distance south of Fleur du Lac, for many years before building a house there in 1970. His family members were wooden boating enthusiasts; his father actually built the family’s first wooden boat. Kromaydis earned an architecture degree from California Polytechnic State University in Pomona. While working at Raymond Vail & Associates in Tahoe City, Kromyadis was introduced to Sahadi by J.C. Krise, and recommended by Earl Hagadorn. Krise was the foreman on the construction of the bandshell for the Godfather II movie. He also played “Old Man Winter” each year in the SnowFest celebration in Tahoe City. Both Kromaydis and Krise were regulars at “Pete and Peters”, a local bar with a Cheers-like atmosphere, where everybody knows your name. Nick began work at Fleur du Lac in 1980 at 30 years old, just after Sahadi completed the purchase, and became a licensed architect later that year. He worked at Fleur du Lac until 1983 when he left to work on Sahadi’s new horse farm, Cardiff Stud Farm. The work was so intense at Fleur du Lac that Nick soon hired two draftsmen to assist him to produce working drawings like those below.
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John Bergsma: Bergsma was the general superintendent of construction at Fleur du Lac. Sahadi has said that he was one of the most important cogs in getting the job done the way Sahadi wanted it done.
Local Artisans: Sahadi preferred to hire local artisans where possible to execute his designs. One of the most interesting local “discoveries”, Irwin Antonitsch, was a young Austrian journeyman machinist whom Sahadi described as a "genius in metal crafting." Although he had a shop at Lake Tahoe near Emerald Bay, Antonitsch set up a blacksmith shop on site at Fleur du Lac to execute all the ornamental iron work Sahadi designed including the beautiful front gates, all fireplace tools and screens in individual houses, the lanterns on the perimeter wall, and the lighthouses on the jetties. Irwin’s company is still active today as European Design Iron in Reno, Nevada.
Sahadi was particularly focused on the elaborate designs he created for granite and marble work at Fleur du Lac including fireplace surrounds, kitchen and bathroom countertops, and flooring. Ed Connely was chosen by Sahadi to execute his designs. Interestingly, Connely’s former specialty had been granite grave headstones. Kromaydis remembers an especially frigid trip to Cold Springs, Minnesota, the granite capital of the United States, with Connely and John Bergsma to source all the granite for Fleur du Lac.
All of the stucco work at Fleur du Lac was done by Tahoe City’s “Mr. Stucco” Bob Watson. Watson and Sahadi created an entirely new stucco process for the homes at Fleur du Lac that has proven to be very effective in withstanding the harsh winter conditions.
How the Team Worked Together
With his team of professionals and artisans in place, Sahadi developed an efficient process to get the design work done. First, Sahadi would sketch or explain his visions to Rick Guidice. An example of the types of sketches Guidice worked from is shown below.
Guidice would translate Sahadi’s ideas to beautiful line drawings, but not working documents as shown below.
Kromaydis was also involved in the translation process as shown by his sketch of the Yacht Club shown below, but primarily translated sketches and concepts into working documents.
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Finally, Earl Hagadorn would review all working documents and sign-off with his Professional Engineer designation and license as necessary. He would then shepherd the drawings through any necessary approval process at the agencies. Of course, Fred Sahadi would be closely involved in all the details, every step of the way.
A clear example of how this process worked can be seen the evolution of one of the most important buildings at Fleur du Lac, the Kaiser era Harbor House. The first photograph below shows the Harbor House as constructed and renovated by Henry Kaiser.
Working with Nick Kromaydis, Sahadi developed the new look he wanted for this historic treasure as seen in the sketch below.
Sahadi’s artisans then constructed his vision of the new Harbor House as seen below.
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