Samuel-Novarro House | |
---|---|
General information | |
Architectural style | Art Deco |
Location | 5609 Valley Oak Dr., Los Feliz, Los Angeles, California |
Completed | 1928 |
Governing body | Private |
Design and construction | |
Architect(s) | Lloyd Wright |
Samuel-Novarro House, also known as the Samuel-Novarro Residence, is a historic Mayan Revival single-family dwelling designed by Lloyd Wright in 1928. It is located at 5609 Valley Oak Dr. in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles. [1] It is Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #130. [2]
Lloyd Wright designed the 2,700-square-foot, [3] three-bedroom, three-bathroom home for Ramon Novarro's manager, Louis Samuel, in 1928 [1] on a 13,267-square-foot hillside lot. [4] When Novarro discovered that Samuel had embezzled funds from him in order to pay for the house, Novarro assumed ownership of it in 1931. [5] [1] He lived there until the late 1930s; in his tenure there, he commissioned Wright to expand the interior as well as the garden, adding a bedroom, music room, and bedroom suite. [6] He also conscripted famed art director Cedric Gibbons to design the interiors in an Art Deco style. [3]
After Novarro vacated, a number of other Hollywood elite occupied the space, including Leonard Bernstein, Jerome Robbins, Betty Comden, and Adolph Green, who rented the home together in 1944 while working on On the Town . [7] Later, restaurateur Michael Chow, producer Charles D. Kasher, and actress Diane Keaton, as well as actress Christina Ricci along with boyfriend actor Adam Goldberg, lived in the house; [3] Keaton purchased the home for $1.5 million in 1988, extensively renovating it and/or restoring it per architect Josh Schweitzer, and eventually selling it in the mid-1990s. [7] [8]
In 2005, Christina Ricci purchased the home for $2.979 million, only to sell it a year later for approximately $2,827,500 after she and Goldberg split. [9] [8] [10] [11]
In 2014, the home was sold for $3.8 million, [11] then listed again in 2016 for $4,295,000. [10]
In 2019, the residence was on the market once more, with an asking price of $4.3 million. [6]
José Ramón Gil Samaniego, known professionally as Ramon Novarro, was a Mexican-American actor. He began his career in silent films in 1917 and eventually became a leading man and one of the top box-office attractions of the 1920s and early 1930s. Novarro was promoted by MGM as a "Latin lover" and became known as a sex symbol after the death of Rudolph Valentino. He is recognized as the first Latin American actor to succeed in Hollywood.
The year 1928 in architecture involved some significant architectural events and new buildings.
Frank Lloyd Wright Jr., commonly known as Lloyd Wright, was an American architect, active primarily in Los Angeles and Southern California. He was a landscape architect for various Los Angeles projects (1922–1924), provided the shells for the Hollywood Bowl (1926–1928), and produced the Swedenborg Memorial Chapel at Rancho Palos Verdes, California (1946–1971). His name is frequently confused with that of his more famous father, Frank Lloyd Wright.
Rudolph Michael Schindler was an Austrian-born American architect whose most important works were built in or near Los Angeles during the early to mid-twentieth century.
John Edward Lautner was an American architect. Following an apprenticeship in the mid-1930s with the Taliesin Fellowship led by Frank Lloyd Wright, Lautner opened his own practice in 1938, where he worked for the remainder of his career. Lautner practiced primarily in California, and the majority of his works were residential. Lautner is perhaps best remembered for his contribution to the development of the Googie style, as well as for several Atomic Age houses he designed in the late 1950s and early 1960s, which include the Leonard Malin House, Paul Sheats House, and Russ Garcia House.
The Ennis House is a residential dwelling in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States, south of Griffith Park. The home was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright for Charles and Mabel Ennis in 1923 and was built in 1924.
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The Samuel Freeman House is a Frank Lloyd Wright house in the Hollywood Hills of Los Angeles, California built in 1923. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1971. The house is also listed as California Historical Landmark #1011 and as Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #247.
John Sowden House, also known as the "Jaws House" or the "Franklin House", is a residence built in 1926 in the Los Feliz section of Los Angeles, California by Lloyd Wright. The house is noted for its use of ornamented textile blocks and for its striking facade, resembling either a Mayan temple or the gaping open mouth of a great white shark.
The Neutra Office Building is a 4,800-square-foot (450 m2) office building in the Silver Lake section of Los Angeles, California. The building was owned and designed by Modernist architect Richard Neutra in 1950. It served as the studio and office for Neutra's architecture practice from 1950 until Neutra's death in 1970. The building has been declared a Historic Cultural Monument and listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It was listed for sale in 2007 at an asking price of $3,500,000.
Holmby Hills is a neighborhood on the Westside of Los Angeles, California, United States.
Millard House, also known as La Miniatura, is a textile block house designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and built in 1923 in Pasadena, California. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1976.
The Rayward–Shepherd House, also known as Tirranna and as the John L. Rayward House, was designed by renowned architect Frank Lloyd Wright and built in New Canaan, Connecticut in 1955 for Joyce and John Rayward. Although commissioned by the Raywards, Herman R. Shepherd completed the design after purchasing it in 1964. William Allin Storrer credits Shepherd's actions with salvaging the house, repairing the poor work that Storrer attributes to John Rayward's "constant pursuit of the lowest bid."
Frank Lloyd Wright was interested in mass production of housing throughout his career. In 1954, he discovered that Marshall Erdman, who contracted the First Unitarian Society of Madison, was selling modest prefabricated homes.
The David and Gladys Wright House is a Frank Lloyd Wright residence built in 1952 in the Arcadia neighborhood of Phoenix, Arizona. It has historically been listed with an address of 5212 East Exeter Boulevard, but currently has an entrance on the 4500 block of North Rubicon Avenue. There currently is no public access to the house.
Clarence Justin Smale, also known as C.J. Smale, was an American architect.
Kenneth Reiner was an American industrialist, philanthropist and inventor best known for constructing Silvertop, a landmark which is recognized one of the prominent architectural works of John Lautner. He also manufactured hair clips and Kaylock, a self-locking aircraft nut. After the World War II broke out, he invented spring steel Lady Ellen Klippies that subsequently captured 90% of market share. In 1974, he was charged with bankruptcy, leading him to sell Silvertop project.