“Upstairs, Downstairs” tours are 1½-hour, docent-guided tours, offered Tuesday and Thursday through Sunday on the hour from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m., July 25 through August 17, 2025
Members: $25 | Non-members: $30 | Children (18 and under): FREE
This summer, the Gamble House will once again open its staff quarters for our special “Upstairs, Downstairs” tours. From July 25 through August 17, visitor’s will have a rare opportunity to observe another side of the Gamble House in a tour that interweaves the lives and spaces of the Gamble family with those of the people who worked in service at the house.
Guests will become acquainted with the work areas of the house, many of which are not seen on the standard tour, including the original laundry and coal rooms of the basement and, the snug yet accommodating living spaces for the household staff. Throughout the house, tourgoers will, learn about the people who contributed to the comfort of the Gambles’ life in Pasadena and explore the historic context of domestic service work in the early 20th century. Visitors will still have the chance to see the family’s social and private spaces that make our standard tour so popular, including the meticulous craftsmanship of Greene and Greene furniture, the specially designed leaded art glass, the unique architectural features and spaces that Greene and Greene created for the Gamble family.
To complement this special tour, the Gamble House will host a series of events and installations titled “Dirty Laundry.” Created by artists Karen Schwenkmeyer and Lisa Mann, “Dirty Laundry” invites reflection on the physical, psychological, and emotional toll of domestic work, as well as the class structures that sometimes rendered these women’s lives invisible. Many of these roles were filled by immigrant women who came to America seeking democracy and opportunity, only to encounter the same rigid hierarchies they had hoped to escape. The installation sheds light on their stories, offering a space for acknowledgment, empathy, and critical examination of labor, class, and gender.
Also included in this exhibition is a reprise of Schwenkmeyer and Mann’s 2019 video installation, The Servants, a 20-minute video that features female domestic workers in silhouette as they go about cleaning, cooking, and laundering. This site-specific work intertwines the experiences of live-in help with early Procter & Gamble Ivory soap advertising, drawing a poignant contrast between the harsh realities of domestic labor and the idealized, commercialized visions of housework in the American imagination.
This exhibition is supported in part by the Perenchio Foundation.
You may also like the following events from The Gamble House:
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