The Nethercutt Collection: Cars, Cosmetics, and Orchestrions

The ideal group outing is hard to find: something more exciting than dinner that still manages to please friends, couples, or relatives with differing tastes.

Leave it to Los Angeles to solve this problem with a destination that’s off the beaten path and sure to interest people with very different tastes. Did you know there’s a four-story gilded vault that houses priceless classic cars from the early 20th century, a huge collection of antique instruments, giant orchestra boxes that play music with the push of a button, and a fascinating history of the cosmetic industry in Hollywood? 

You can find all this and more at the Nethercutt Collection in Sylmar. 

It all started with Merle Norman Cosmetics. Merle Norman was the name of a real person, the woman who started this cosmetic company out of her kitchen in Santa Monica in the early 20th century. Her nephew, J.B. Nethercutt, spent much of his childhood with his aunt and became her first employee in 1932, when he was 19 years old. 

The company grew into a huge industry because it supplied cosmetics to the growing film industry. J.B. eventually bought Merle Norman from his aunt. The Nethercutt Collection isn’t a cosmetics collection or a makeup factory, though. It’s a monument to the passions that mattered to J.B. in his personal life. 

He married his high school sweetheart, Dorothy, in 1933. During more than 70 years of marriage, this couple shared a great love for beautiful things, particularly of a rare nature. The impressive collections they amassed, preserved, and prepared for display can be enjoyed today in the Nethercutt Collection and Museum, which is housed in the San Sylmar Tower, a massive estate that Nethercutt built in the 1970s to house his growing car collection.   

There are two ways to experience the Nethercutt legacy. For just $5, you can visit the Nethercutt Museum. It’s open 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Thursdays, Fridays, and Saturdays. It features a large showroom full of 130 magnificent cars. No reservation is needed.  

You can take your time strolling down the corridors of beauties ranging from 1920s limousines to an occasional 1950s convertible. There’s a huge fleet of Cadillacs and another collection of Rolls Royces, spanning several decades. Each car has a helpful sign, explaining its make, model, year, history, and particular background.  

Some of the cars are celebrities. There’s one that belonged to silent film star Fatty Arbuckle. Others have appeared in films. Some have been driven in the Rose Parade. Many have won the highest awards at the Pebble Beach Concours d’Elegance. The majority of the cars are from the 1910s–1930s, and they all look as fresh as the day they rolled off the assembly line.  

Besides the cars, the museum has a beautiful locomotive and private train car on display out back. Visitors can climb aboard the 1937 Canadian Pacific Royal Hudson Locomotive and explore the 1912 Pullman Private Car to observe the glory days of travel before commercial aviation. Both have been beautifully restored. 

To experience the full magnificence of the Nethercutt experience, though, you’re going to want to book a guided tour to view the Nethercutt Collection across the street. Tours are on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at 10 a.m. and also at 1:30 p.m. on Saturday. Advance reservations are necessary and can be made online or by phone. 

The Nethercutt Collection is probably best known as a classic car museum. The amazing collection includes over 250 American and European cars in amazingly pristine condition. These priceless automobiles are displayed in three areas—the Lower Salon, the Grand Salon, and the Nethercutt Museum. The Nethercutts began their collection of classic cars in the 1950s. Over the years, they spent a fortune buying, restoring, and eventually entering their amazing automobiles in the most prestigious classic car shows around the country. Mr. Nethercutt built his own team to fix up the cars he bought inhouse, employing specialists in everything except glass, tires, and chrome. To this day, the Collection continues to restore, inspect, and maintain all its own cars. 

The guided tour begins in the Lower Salon, a subterranean garage-like room that features some of the older cars in the collection. This is a simple beginning to the experience, as you get a close look at these amazing machines and begin to understand the man who collected them.  

The tour really becomes interesting, though, when you go upstairs to the Grand Salon, which is a few steps above ground level. This room looks like a ballroom, with opulent pillars, a wall of mirrors, huge chandeliers, and a grand staircase. All this provides the perfect backdrop for the finest jewels in the car collection. The pride of the collection is the 1936 Duesenberg Convertible Roadster for $5,000, which was one of the first cars in J.B.’s collection. It wasn’t on the floor when I visited this time, but I saw it during my first visit nine years ago. Its engine is currently being restored to peak condition, so hopefully it will be available for public viewing again soon. 

Ascending the grand staircase leads you to the Mezzanine, which holds a collection of classic hood ornaments and other antique car trinkets. It also holds some fascinating antique musical machines, like phonographs that are over 100 years old. The tour guide may give you a sample of how music sounded in the early 20th century by cranking up a phonograph to play an old record. Among this eclectic collection of priceless items is a huge sterling silver sculpture made to commemorate the opening of the Panama Canal in 1915. 

From the mezzanine, there’s a lovely spiral staircase to the building’s top floor. The beige walls are decorated with shining gold music notes. These notes aren’t arranged in random order, though. They form the melody to the Nethercutts’ favorite song, “Stairway to the Stars.”  

At the top of the stairs, you enter the Music Room. This is by far my favorite room in the collection. It’s a beautiful parlor of antiques, but what antiques! The formal dining room is furnished with an ornate Louis XIV dining set, including chairs that are purposely missing the left arm. The magnificent chandelier above the table is reflected by the mirrors on either wall. 

The walls are lined by nickelodeons and their larger European counterpart, the orchestrion. These giant music boxes are a mechanical marvel. Built in the days before sound recording, these giant machines often look like large armoires or small organs. Working on a technological principle similar to the player piano, they use a combination of vacuum and pressure to propel air through wood pipes and synthesize the sound of dozens of different instruments. These orchestrions range from a small one with a few violins to a 15-foot wide German black one with a magnificent painting on glass depicting a Wagnerian opera scene.  

The room also houses a collection of impressive antique instruments. There’s a gorgeous ornate piano from the era of Austrian Emperor Franz Joseph. There’s a customized Bosendorfer grand piano with an extra octave of keys. The piece de resistance of the collection is a huge Wurlitzer pipe organ, built for a movie theater during the silent film era. It’s the largest in the western United States and the third largest in the world. 

A tour always includes a demonstration from several of the orchestrions, which produce an impressive amount of sound. The enchanting music sounds like carousel music, which was originally produced by orchestrions. For the grand finale, the seafoam green curtains rise on either side of the room, revealing two skylines of pipes, and the organ plays a medley of songs.  

Visiting the Nethercutt Collection and Museum is a perfect outing for people who are interested in classic cars, antique furniture, historic instruments, or all of the above! All the docents of the guided tours are extremely knowledgeable and passionate about the collection. Some are car buffs, while others are music historians.  

The Collection has hosted concerts and movie screenings in the Music Room, particularly silent films with live organ accompaniment on the Wurlitzer. No events are currently scheduled for the remainder of 2026, but keep an eye on the website for updates! 

The Nethercutt Collection and Museum is a true hidden gem that every Southern California native or tourist should visit at least once.