The 2003 Steve Martin-Bonnie Hunt family comedy “Cheaper by the Dozen” was a (very loose) remake of the 1950s classic. It’s about a harried couple juggling work and a busy household with 12 children.
This is a great “house movie” for those of us more interested in the sets than watching, for instance, family food fights.
In the beginning, the Baker family lives in a charming white farmhouse in the Illinois countryside. And then they move to a huge, rambling Victorian with a fabulous turret in Evanston.
Read on to take a closer look at both of the houses in the movie and learn about where they were filmed!
The “Cheaper by the Dozen” Farmhouse
Director Shawn Levy says they shot on location in Petaluma, California, which made things a lot more difficult than they would have been on a soundstage.
“I don’t know what the heck I was thinking.” But adds that he “wanted the movie to look beautiful.”
In real life, the farmhouse is a 2,000 acre apple orchard known as Two Rock Ranch.
Living Room:
Kate is writing a book about life with 12 kids called — you guessed it — Cheaper by the Dozen.
The Kitchen:
“The thing I love about the production design in this movie is the texture of real life in every scene,” Levy says.
The Production Designer for the shoot was Nina Ruscio.
Set Decorator was K.C. Fox.
They did a good job giving the sets the look of big-family chaos and clutter.
An Entertainment Weekly review summed it up well:
“Having a big family seems like lots of fun — and then you meet someone like Tom (Steve Martin) and Kate Baker (Bonnie Hunt), whose 12 children can spill more milk and harbor more illegal pets than any other 12 children we know.”
The director says it took several days to shoot the scrambled eggs scene in the farmhouse kitchen.
“We were all nauseous by the end of it from the smell of rotting eggs.”
When Tom gets a new job as a football coach in the city, they have to leave the farmhouse.
They were sad about that for about a minute.
And then they saw the fabulous Victorian in Evanston, Illinois, that they were moving to!
The “Cheaper by the Dozen” House in Evanston
In the movie the house they move to is in Evanston, Illinois.
But they filmed at a real house on Lorraine Boulevard in the Windsor Square neighborhood of Los Angeles.
2022 Update: It’s on the market!
According to Seeing Stars:
“In the film, there is a fake street sign out front saying Forest Ave – S. 300. Ignore it. There is no Forest Ave in Hancock Park. It’s actually at the northwest corner of Lorraine Blvd. & 4th Street.”
The interiors were built on a separate soundstage:
It was a two-story set, which is really unusual.
Levy wanted to be able to film the movement of the characters going up and down the stairs.
He says it probably cost more than building a real house would have been.
There are incredible details they added to the set.
It looks like it could be a real house where a large family lives.
The Living Room:
The Turret Bedroom:
The Kitchen:
Steve Martin, who doesn’t have any children himself, said, “I played fathers so many times, it’s like being one. I’ve had children of every age. And like I say, I get to do everything but the dirty work. Their parents have to take them home and deal with all that.”
Update: The “Cheaper by the Dozen” house is for sale!
A fan of the original? Check out the Second Empire Victorian from it.
Visit my Houses Onscreen page to see the other movies I’ve featured, listed A-Z.
I love the old farmhouse and how it looks so worn and real – and I appreicate that it is REAL and not on a soundstage! The set designers must have so much fun doings these houses!
I appreciate that they did a pretty good job of showing us what the houses would look like with 12 kids living there. I loved the shot with the cool black board calendar/scheduler in the background! 🙂
Just curious: when you post these movie scenes, do you Tweet it specifically to the actors? It would be fun to get their comments. Both Steve Martin and Bonnie Hunt Tweet regularly so it means they would likely see (and pay attention to) your thread. Here are the two Twitter handles:
@SteveMartinToGo
@BonnieHunt_real
I never thought to do that! What an interesting idea. I wonder if they’d respond?
I have an alter-ego that blogs (not about houses so I don’t use that link here) and whenever I post something, I see if the relevant persons or company has a Twitter feed. Nine times out of ten, they comment or reTweet or respond. I’m a Twitter junkie. Note: just because someone has a Twitter account, doesn’t mean they actually use it. I check before bothering to add them. Some celebs got a handle because they didn’t want to lose their own name but one Tweet and done. I follow Steve Martin’s feed and he’s very active. And funny.
War of the Roses would be a great movie house to cover…
…And Housesitter…
It’s great that the set designers made these houses look like any house, not like some perfect house in a magazine. I love the house with the turret. Didn’t know it was in Hancock Park. I must look for it the next time I drive over there.
Thank you for sharing this. It’s one of my favorites. I love the exterior and that foyer. They are both so gorgeous.
That turret room is so cool and I never understood how the boy could be so disappointed having to sleep in it. I would love it as my room.
One of my other favorite movie houses is the one from the movie “Matilda” that the Trunchbull lived in. I love it so much it’s on my “top favorite movie houses” list.
I’m too tired and lazy to check my facts, but I think those scenes in Matilda were filmed in an actual house–the same used in Catch Me If You Can for the Strongs’ house.
The houses are both great, but I would love any house that came with Steve Martin. And, hopefully, his banjo!
Love all of the houses you’ve featured today …
But the one that touches my heart even after all these years, is the one from Meet Me In St. Louis.
I like the first house better. The second one is too grand for my taste.
By the way, I’d love to see you show the house from “The Love Letter” with Kate Capshaw and Ellen DeGeneres. Kind of a goofy movie but the sets are gorgeous!!!!!!
I love both of those houses. My cousins’ Victorian house in Indiana has a back staircase. I was always so jealous.
By the way, did you know that the real-life “Cheaper by the Dozen” parents were industrial engineers / efficiency experts who often used their large family to conduct experiments.
No Way!!! We just drove through Two Rock last weekend and I told my husband for about the eleven hundredth time that I should be living out in the country in Sonoma or West Marin. Dang. I’ll have to look out for that house next time.
Kirst, Thankyou Julia for posting this: it is a timeless film( love it) and congratulations to the set design because they had a really good job of showing a daily life house,in a film for real….
Giggle, giggle. I know these were movie sets, but! How refreshing to see rooms that are not “after” photos or have been scrubbed, polished and culled into submission prior to a photo layout or sales brochure. My children have moved on but at least one room of the house needs to be dusted, my cat Daffodil has left a hair ball somewhere, breakfast dishes need to be put in the dishwasher as soon as I unload the darned thing, my perfectly organized pantry somehow came undone sometime during the night, I need to go to the grocery store so won’t reorganize the pantry right now and I still don’t have the paper management thing down in spite of all the tips I get from About.com. I just purchased a new book so I guess I will fire up the old Kindle and get to reading.
Wow! The old farmhouse is in my home town! I’ve never seen it. I’ll have to google it or ask my parents about it. Fun!
I found this and wanted to share: https://www.itsfilmedthere.com/2010/08/cheaper-by-dozen.html
Thanks, Bridget!
Julia,
Just had to share that this same house made the local newspaper. It’s going to be one of the hertiage tour homes in Petaluma in a couple of weeks:
https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20120907/LIFESTYLE/120909782?Title=Cinema-setting-in-Petaluma-
I guess you’ll know what I’ll be doing that day!
Kind regards!
Oh, wow! I’d love to be able to take that tour. Thanks for the link, Bridget!
I remember watching this movie and loving those spice colored dining chairs. I’m so happy you have a blog for me to relive them! I prefer the second house–too much clutter at the farmhouse.
Julia,
My sister and I toured the farm house today. The house is used as a wedding location besides being an organic apple farm. To compare your pictures above with what we saw today was like night and day. The house was quite stark. We walked in the front door to see a large office type of room to the right. A long hallway straight a head with the staircase. To the left was the livingroom and further left was the kitchen. We were not allowed upstairs as somebody is living there. Everything I loved about the house was missing. The house we saw today seemed like a shell in comparison. The property was truly beautiful but the house seem to lack warmth the movie showed it had.
Interesting that it’s so different in real life! Thanks, Bridget.