Frank Lloyd Wright: Restoration-Ready In Hollywood, $4.25M

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We’re so used to those polished, evocatively staged images in real estate listings, it’s refreshing that the listing for Frank Lloyd Wright’s historic Freeman House deploys instead a selection of atmospheric vintage images from 1972.

Brought to market by pioneering architecture specialist broker Mike Deasy, CEO and co-founder of Deasy Penner Podley, the Samuel and Harriet Freeman House is one of Wright’s projects from his brief sojourn in Los Angeles and one of his three “textile block” houses in the Hollywood HIlls. It’s got an extraordinary pedigree– the Freemans hired Wright after being smitten by Wright’s earlier LA project, the c.1922 Hollyhock House. Subsequent alterations were undertaken by Rudolph Schindler and John Lautner, and the sale includes some original furniture. Constructed in the years 1923-25 of pre-cast blocks and tiles, it was donated to USC by the Freemans to USC in the mid-eighties; they had lived there for 61 years. Subsequently damaged by the Northville earthquake in 1994, USC undertook an extensive stabilization effort but major restoration of the Freeman House remains undone, and it represents a unique opportunity to bring an unmatched jewel of American architecture back to life.

More: Go to the USC website (scroll down) for additional details about the Freeman house and its occupants, including a set of evocative c.1953 images by Julius Shulman.  Go to the scholarly Deasy Penner Podley dedicated site for the Freeman House for additional images, Wright’s original renderings, floor plans and an impressive selection of links.

Photo Credit: Freeman House Photographic Portfolio. Dan Soderberg, Photographer. Photographs are from March and September 1972, with permission from Harriet Freeman. Courtesy: Dan Soderberg