[6] The Harvard School for Boys was established in 1900 by Grenville C. Emery as a military academy on the site of a barley field at the corner of Western Avenue and Sixteenth Street (now Venice Boulevard) in Los Angeles.

In 1937, the school moved to its campus at the former Hollywood Country Club on Coldwater Canyon in Studio City after receiving a $25,000 ($530,000 today) loan from aviation pioneer Donald Douglas.

[8] In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Harvard School gradually discontinued both boarding and its standing as a military academy, while expanding its enrollment, courses, classes, teachers, and curriculum.

[10] The Westlake School for Girls was established in 1904 by Jessica Smith Vance and Frederica de Laguna in what is now downtown Los Angeles, California, as an exclusively female institution offering elementary and secondary education.

[citation needed] Buildings on the Upper School campus include: the Munger Science Center and computer lab; the Rugby building which houses the English department, 300-seat theater, costume shop, and drama lab; the Seaver building, home to the foreign language and history departments as well as administrative offices and the visitor lobby; Chalmers, which houses the performing arts and math departments, book store, cafeteria, sandwich window, and student lounge; Kutler, which houses the Brendan Kutler Center for Interdisciplinary Studies and Independent Research[15][16] and the Feldman-Horn visual arts studios, dark room, video labs, and gallery.

[18] The school also maintains an off-campus baseball facility, the O'Malley Family Field, in Encino, California.

Other expenses—which include books, meals, and class activities—typically average $2,500 to $3,500— with an additional $3,000 to $3,600 for those who take advantage of the school's comprehensive bus service.