Taste Takes A Holiday

   One of the great benefits of the march of time is how often the tables get turned on the meanest of villains.
    Remember Mr Blackwell, the self-appointed arbiter of taste who each year published his list of the "10 Worst Dressed Women"? This the the man who said the Wynona Judd looked "..like Hulk Hogan in sequins," and that Martha Stewart "..dresses like the centerfold for Farmer's Almanac."
  Well guess whose long term home in the Windsor Square section of Hancock Park just came on the market? Let's just say that given his taste in home decorating perhaps he should have been a little kinder to those he made fun of.

  The exterior of the house could easily be improved by replacing the phallic shrubbery with some good landscaping. It sits on a good sized lot, with two separate guest houses out back. But the interior seems to be done in High Wasp Camp. Ultimately, all one can say is that perhaps one man's  object d'art is another man's tchotchke. But this guy was out to corner the market.

 

Aside from being stuffed to the gills, the decor is dark and oppressive with conflicting patterns and unappealing, random color schemes. As for the late Mr. Blackwell's treatment of his guests, it wasn't much better.

Here's the living room of the main guest house, a room that clearly says, "Please have a seat; the Gerontologist will be with you in a moment." This was the man telling America how to dress?
  Indeed, the elegant, Waspily named "Mr. Blackwell" was born Richard Selzer and grew up in a tenement in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. He managed to parlay a brief acting career into costume design, then fashion design (The House of Blackwell") then Arbiter of Taste. 
   Well the house of Blackwell is now on the market, asking $2,000,000.

 Personally, I feel if kitsch is one's goal, be honest about it and go all out. In other words, "If you can't hide it-flaunt it," which brings me to another new Hancock Park listing, a house that thousands of people in Los Angeles have made a pilgrimage to see in person.

Yes, it's the house with the 24 naked statues of David lining the driveway. The ideal time to see this house, of course, is during the Christmas Season...

..when each David gets a Santa cap and jacket but, alas, no pants.
In a million years I couldn't begin to tell you what the actual style of this house is or was supposed to be. Apparently, neither can the owners and I give them much credit for going with it all the way. Of course if you've gone this far on the outside...

...you can't short change the interior, and they haven't. Here's the dining room which I don't even know how to explain or interpret beyond guessing that the impetus behind the decor may have been a bad 70's acid trip.     There are 7 bedrooms and 7 baths, in 4800 square feet, a pool and a large yard. The asking price is $2,400,000 and the listing agent (whom no one has ever heard of) won't even take your phone call-he only accepts email messages. Let me know if you want to see it, and we'll see if he can read.
Jamie Foreman

Two dirty little real estate secrets.....

Secret #1: Investors are out there buying NOW. In fact, according to Inman News, investors are three times more active right now than traditional homebuyers. 33% of investors surveyed are intending to buy during the next two years, as opposed to 8.6% of typical homebuyers. Of the investors, 11% expect to resell  their properties within the next year, while 50% intend to hold the properties for at least five years.
   The message here is pretty clear: now is the time to BUY property in Los Angeles.

Secret #2: There are a lot of bad houses out there. What some people don't realize is that it's my job to make sure my clients aren't wasting their time by looking at them; it's my job to screen them out. Now of course one man's 'bad' house may be another man's castle and, as I've seen over all these years, money can fix a lot of 'bad'.
   But not all. It's my job to let you know that a certain layout or a certain location may limit the return you ultimately see on the property. Most of the time these are properties I will eliminate from the list of those you should be seeing, because neither of us needs to be wasting our time. On a typical Tuesday, which is Broker's Open House day in Los Angeles for new listings, I'll see 10-12 houses in a 3 hour span, in various parts of town. There are some Tuesdays when, by house #10, I just want to be put out of my misery. Some of the houses may be just plain bad with no architectural, aesthetic or practical merit. Some will be mundane copies of what sellers,designers or flippers perceive as the reigning style, a style which has already become its own cliche and is on the way out. And some may be wonderful houses that are woefully over priced. As a client of mine, you will get to skip these.
      Sometimes listing agents will unwittingly give me a helping hand and spare me the pain of having to physically see their listings, simply by the photos they choose to post on the MLS. Photos are a very tricky thing. There are any number of properties where I'll see the photos first and think "Wow!", only to then discover, upon seeing the house, that the photos far exceed the real experience. Then again, certain houses or certain rooms do not lend themselves to photos that actually tell the story of what that house feels like. I try to be cautious on my listings that the photos are not misleading, but I would rather have few photos than bad photos or pictures that really tell you nothing other than what furniture the Seller owns.
   Yet some of the best laughs I get are from listing photos in the MLS where I'm totally mystified as to why the listing agent thought this photo would want to make potential buyers live there. Here are a few of my recent favorites in this category:

This is a house up on the 'Bird' streets above the Sunset Strip, on the market for $1,400,000! What's the message here? "Live here and you too can be messy?" Or maybe, "Hey-buy my house AND clean it up for me."

This is a house in Beachwood Canyon, on the market for just shy of $1,700,000. Okay, at least they cleaned the room, even if they didn't have time to hang the picture or replace the dead flowers. But they could have just told us there is a bathroom because does this photo really inspire the fantasy of living there?

Really? This one is my favorite. Look, I've had to run in and make, or remake, plenty of beds during my career in real estate. But what does this photo say to a prospective buyer? Clearly, "I'm about to kill myself. Want to join me?"
  Not too surprisingly, all 3 of these homes have been languishing on the market for quite a long time. The good news is that you and I will not be seeing them.
Jamie Foreman

Fickett Times Two

Two homes by noted California architect Edward Fickett have suddenly come on the market this week in the Hollywood Hills. Fickett, who died in 1999, was known not only for such projects as Spago, Dodger Stadium and Mammoth Mountain House, but for the California modern style he brought to the design of so many homes. His signature would seem to have been bringing the outdoors inside-an openness that incorporates Southern California's greatest natural asset. His homes were much more numerous than say Neutra or Ain and seemed to have been aimed at a wider audience: the upper middle class family as opposed to the collector. Both of these homes are great examples of his strengths and both were built in 1959.

The first Fickett, tucked away on a quiet cul-de-sac, remains remarkably true to it original style. 3 bedrooms and 3 baths in 2,400 square feet with great yards both front and rear. Asking price is $1,425,000.

There's an openeness and a simplicty to the finishes that demonstrate mid-century design at it's best, not to mention a great pool out back.

The second Fickett has been reimagined to create Fickett to the Nth degree.

The design emphasizes Fickett's style to the point of magnifying it, bringing it into the new century.

For collectors of mid-century furnishings, it's a dream come true. The public spaces of the house are all open to each other, built around a center, glass atrium. There are 4 bedrooms with 3 1/2 baths in 2,500 square feet.

Here it becomes clear that Fickett's art was not only in bringing the outside inside, but in exposing the inside to the outside as well; a piece of art to be enjoyed from both vantage points. Asking price on this one is $1,895,000.
If you'd like further information and more pictures, don't hesitate to email me at james4man@gmail.com. And don't forget, you can subscribe via email by just clicking the link below.
Jamie Foreman

Those Wright boys...Like Father, Like Son

Given that you can count on one hand the number of houses is Los Angeles designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, it's extraordinary that currently, in Los Feliz, one of his creations is on the market as well as one nearby designed by his son, Lloyd Wright.
  Let's start with the Lloyd Wright:

Lloyd Wright's creation, sited directly on Franklin Avenue, is built around a center court swimming pool. It's brilliant-the living room at one end and the master bedroom at the other,  facing the pool, as do the rooms and hallways along the sides, which are glassed and open to that courtyard. There are 4 bedrooms, 5 baths and a heavy Mayan temple influence, very much like the house his Dad designed.

Okay, he copied his Dad, but at least he had a good example, and isn't that the sincerest form of flattery? The house has been restored and renovated by a local designer, who shall remain nameless for the moment; I'm not sure his bathrooms truly reflect the originals and I have to say it is the most over-linened house I've ever been in, but the work is generally respectful and top-of-the-line. It is truly an architectural statement and a very liveable house at the same time. Asking price is $4,200,000.

Also on the market is Frank Lloyd Wright's Ennis-Brown house, in the hills of Los Feliz, and it is staggering. It was designed for Charles and Mabel Ennis and built in 1924. In 1940 Wright returned to oversee the addition of a pool, a north terrace, a billiard room and a heating system (good move). It is one of Wright's designs of interlocked, pre-cast concrete blocks, made from the earth excavated from the building site-does that make it one of the earliest 'green' construction projects? Probably not, as there really is nothing practical about this house. But as you stand in the very center of it, surrounded by Wright designed stained glass and rich wood, looking out at the mountains on one side and the whole city on the other, with downtown L.A. glimmering off in the distance like Oz, you can't help but get the chills.  It is nothing short of brilliant. There certainly is a huge amount of work to do here, which won't be either easy or cheap (it is on the National Register of Historic Places and is a California Historical Landmark as well). But when you finish, you will have one of the worlds' great residences, one in which you cannot help but feel the history of Los Angeles all around you.

The practical information is that the house is about 6,000 square feet, and there are chauffeur's quarters also across the driveway, above the garage; currently 4 bedrooms, 4.5 baths. But that may all seem secondary, as 'practical' would never be a word to describe this house. Full Disclosure: I visited the Ennis-Brown house 13 years ago with my son's second grade class; they were studying architecture that year when they weren't learning to read and count. At that point, Mr. Brown was still living there; he bought the house years earlier and then 'gave' it to USC I believe for tax purposes and most likely because he couldn't afford the upkeep. While I was in total awe of the house, most of the 8 year olds were terribly unimpressed. They only asked two questions of the lovely docent who showed us around: 1) Why does Mr. Brown have TWO answering machines? and 2) Does Mr. Brown own a gun?  We left shortly after that second question.

  The current asking price for this house if $5,999,000 which certainly seems more reasonable than the $15,000,000 price tag it had when it came on the market a year ago.

  If you'd like further information or full pictures of either of these incredible homes, just email me at: james4man@gmail.com.

   Jamie Foreman

Drives Me Crazy- Part 2

I can't help it-great architecture drives me crazy. No, actually the opposite is true-it calms me down.  Currently on the market is one of the original "Hollywoodland" homes in Beachwood Canyon (see picture above of what the area and this house looked like at the time). Sited on a promontory (with an extra lot included in the purchase) this 1926 Tudor has wonderful views and light and stunning orignal details. The living room has 13' ceilings and, of course, a woodburning fireplace, not to mention windows on three sides. In fact, as was typical of homes of the era, all rooms have windows on at least two sides. Besides the living room, dining room and a fantastic cook's kitchen, the first floor also includes an office overlooking the gardens and a separate guest suite. Upstairs there are two bedrooms suites with glorious views and impeccably tiled original baths. A classic dream come true, asking $1,579,000.
  Email me at james4man@gmail.com if you'd like full information and pictures.
Jamie Foreman

Drives Me Crazy-Part 1

 

Great architecture drives me crazy! And it's not so easy to find. In fact, more often than not, we have to go back in time to find the very best. The very best always turns out to be the most classic. For example, this 1936 Streamline Moderne, designed by William Kesling and located in the hills of Silver Lake. Kesling was an interesting guy; he had his ups and downs business-wise, but his designs are pure 30's Deco and their purity holds up today. There are only a few of his homes in Silver Lake and this one is currently on the market for $885,000. The current owner has maintained his design perfectly while revising the kitchen superbly using SubZero, Viking and Bosch appliances and adding central air conditioning. There are 3 bedrooms, one of which would make a perfect office with it's own private entrance, and one bath (with space for another off the master bedroom). There are open city views and brilliant light all day. The total effect his hypnotic.
  Email me at james4man@gmail.com if you'd like complete information and pictures. "Kesling Modern Structures" is available through Amazon.com.
  Jamie Foreman

Take two, they're small......

. ..actually, they're not small at all and they are SPECTACULAR. This compound consists of two magnificent Outpost Estates Spanish homes plus garage with one bedroom guest unit. The 'north' house is beautifully redone with a very contemporary slant; the 'south' house is the best restoration I've seen on a classic Spanish, anywhere. Every detail is beautifully done and never overdone. This is California architecture at its very best. The compound is currently 'celebrity owned' and both houses have had a number of celebrity owners over the years including (age test:) Lee J. Cobb, who owned the 'north' house at one point. Asking price for the compound is $11,495,000; owner will sell the 'south' house for 7,900,000. I can't think of anyone who wouldn't want to live here, but should you know anyone for whom it might be right, have them call me and you can email me at james4man@gmail.com for details or for a link to see the video tour.
 Jamie Foreman