Newsletter: Hot Property: Behind closed doors
A home can tell us a lot about its occupants and how they spend their private time — working out, curled up before a fire with a good book or entertaining in lavish style. Or, if the place had been staged with rented furnishings and accessories, it can tell us very little at all.
This week we saw both types of homes and a few we weren’t sure which category they fell into. Join us for a look inside the lives and houses of some notable owners.
– Lauren Beale and Neal J. Leitereg
Telltale closet contents
Singer and actress Selena Gomez listed her house in a gated Calabasas community for sale at $4.495 million after buying it only a year and a half ago for $3.69 million.
That quick of a turnaround suggests a home flip, but a couple of "tells" suggest it’s been the 23-year-old’s home. The master suite is painted a somewhat passionate purple — not a usual staged-for-sale color — and the listing photos show that the enormous closet is full of clothes.
Selena Gomez's three-acre compound includes a main house, a guest house and a swimming pool with outdoor entertainment areas. (Realtor.com | Inset: Getty Images)
A kitchen extraordinaire
Sometimes a new owner will take on a place lock, stock and barrel and purposefully preserve it. Such was the fate of the holiday home of cooking legend Julia Child near Grasse, France.
The kitchen still exists much as it did during her time at the charming hillside home. Designed by Julia’s husband, Paul, it was built with tall counters to accommodate her 6-foot-2 height.
Pots, pans and pieces of cooking equipment hang on peg-board-covered walls. The outlines of the cooking tools were hand painted by her husband.
La Pitchoune, as the house is known, became a culinary school in 1993 run by American Kathie Alex, who is the seller. The native Californian preserved the spirit of the house and adopted Child’s resident cat.
The former French holiday home of Julia Child is for sale near Grasse, France. (Côte d'Azur Sotheby's International Realty | Thirteen / WNET New York)
Belly up to the bar
For the most part, the Spanish Revival house that comedian Adam Carolla and his wife, Lynette Paradise, have listed for sale in Hollywood Hills is empty of furnishings. The place was leased out last year.
But during their dozen years of ownership, the couple might have thrown a party or two. The estate features a vintage pub with its own awning-topped entrance.
Porthole windows over the bar peer out onto the swimming pool. A row of red bar chairs look well-worn and inviting.
A time capsule
The longtime Beverly Hills-area home of Academy Award-winning actor Charlton Heston recalls a life of Hollywood celebrity and starring roles in such epics as “The Ten Commandments.” The starburst carpet, the marble bar and period light fixtures retain the Midcentury Modern house’s '60s vibe.
The two-story library within the master suite speaks to a lifelong love of the written word. The sheer quantity of books brings to mind Moses parting the Red Sea — that’s a lot of reading to plow through.
The Midcentury Modern home built for actor Charlton Heston is for sale in the Beverly Hills Post Office area. (Jeff Elson)
A lifetime of mementos
Potential buyers come to see the condo, but they linger and admire the memorabilia. That’s the report from agent Tania Ferris of Coldwell Banker, who listed a Wilshire Corridor unit that belonged to pivotal Swing Era composer Van Alexander for more than two decades.
Alexander, who died this year at 100, kept items he had acquired over a lifetime of entertainment at his home. There are no tiskets or taskets, to borrow from the title of his hit jazz song sung by Ella Fitzgerald, included in the $1,189,900 asking price.
The Wilshire Boulevard condominium was the home of bandleader Van Alexander, who died this year at 100. (Jeffrey Ong)
Leaving his signature
A Hollywood Hills home with a cast of characters in its history is for sale at $4.199 million. But the only name whose fingerprints remain on the residence are those of Walt Disney Concert Hall architect Frank Gehry.
He redesigned the 1940s Traditional-style house in the 1980s, adding light- and window-filled space on the upper level.
The interior was easy to identify as staged due to this tell: The books on the bookshelves are all covered in brown paper wrapping.
The 1940s home was redesigned by world-renowned architect Frank Gehry. (Marc Angeles / Unlimited Style Photography)
Intriguing design
This dramatic desert house in Palm Springs was designed for the late actor David Janssen, but “The Fugitive” star never got to live in the residence, which exudes a ruggedness with its exterior and interior stone surfaces.
The sexy dome-topped living spaces, a long bar and a central open-plan dining room look both retro and futuristic.
Inside and out, the structure preserves the vision that architect Edward Giddings had for the television and film star, who died in 1980 at 48.
The Palms Springs home was designed by architect Ed Giddings for David Janssen. (Doyle Terry | Getty Images)
From the archives
Hot Property marks its 31st birthday this month. That’s no small accomplishment for a newspaper column that bet on nosiness and struck a chord.
If you missed our 30th anniversary edition last year, here's a look back at some of our greatest hits from the last three decades:
— Thirty-one years ago, Magic Johnson flies his parents out from Michigan to approve the purchase of an English country-style home in Bel-Air for about $2.35 million. The Lakers superstar would later add a basketball half-court to the property.
— A decade later, Academy Award-winner Sidney Poitier and his wife, Joanna, make headlines with the $4.5-million sale of their longtime home in Beverly Hills. The couple would decamp to New York City, buying a co-op in a pre-World War II building.
— Ten years ago, Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne put their Beverly Hills home made famous on the reality series "The Osbournes" up for sale for $11.9 million.
What we’re reading
Whoever said a man’s home is his castle could have been talking about Coloradan Jim Bishop. He has spent years building a 160-tall-fortress of rock and stained glass in Rye, a town about 145 miles south of Denver.
A maze of winding staircases and towering turrets, the place has grown from a small cottage to a tourist attraction. "No one ever falls because they sense the danger and hold on tighter," Bishop said of his creation.
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