The University of Southern California is selling a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Los Angeles home, one of four in the city using concrete blocks, for $4.25 million.
The University of Southern California is selling a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed Los Angeles home, one of four in the city using concrete blocks, for $4.25 million.
The Samuel and Harriet Freeman House in the Hollywood Hills was constructed with more than 12,000 cast concrete blocks used both inside and out, and features a salon-style layout with a central hearth, partially open kitchen and several outdoor spaces. It was created by the famed American architect between 1923 and 1925.
The two-bedroom, 2,884-square-foot residence is “a treasure that needs restoration,” said listing agent Mike Deasy, the CEO of Deasy Penner Podley, a brokerage that specializes in architecturally significant and historic properties.
“We’ve seen interest from art collectors and institutions,” Mr. Deasy said.
There are also oversize corner windows.
The Freemans became enamoured with Wright’s work when they were guests at his Hollyhock House in East Hollywood, a building that “bridges [his] Prairie style of the preceding decades and his textile block structures of the 1920s,” according to the Frank Lloyd Wright Foundation.
The home incorporates more than 12,000 cast concrete blocks.
The couple commissioned Wright to build a $10,000 home, which ultimately cost $23,000, according to the foundation. A champion of organic architecture—which melds the natural and built environments—he used local sand to create the concrete for the blocks, which give the home a unified design throughout.
Another view of a corner window.
It is one of “Wright’s 20 most important houses…the missing link between two World Heritage sites: Taliesin and Fallingwater,” according to the writings of architectural historian Kathryn Smith, who was quoted in the listing. “The spatial design, the main room opening through transparent diagonal corners, the unique concrete block detailing, and the bold hillside setting with expansive city views…all create a spectacular expression.”
After 61 years in residence, the Freemans donated the home to the USC’s School of Architecture. The school made the house structurally sound, but the cladding needs to be restored, as do the systems throughout the house.
“It’s not for the faint of heart,” Mr. Deasy said. “It’s for someone interested in saving Wright.”
The property includes many of the original furnishings designed for the house by Wright and Rudolf Schindler, an Austrian-born architect and concrete enthusiast working in Los Angeles.
USC also recently sold the Seeley Mudd Estate, a 7-acre property in San Marino, California, that was the long-time home of the university’s presidents. It sold for $25 million earlier this month, a record price for the city.