KEEPER OF THE CASTLE : Van Nuys Towers Rise From Business Professor’s Dreams
Robert Bond’s home is literally his castle.
Fulfilling a lifelong fantasy, Bond, a business administration professor at Los Angeles Valley College, has turned his “ugly, dreary” Van Nuys home into a replica of a 13th-Century Scottish castle.
His kingdom, at the corner of Chandler Boulevard and Fulton Avenue on a 12,500-square-foot lot, has been under construction for more than a year and is about two months from completion. And Bond, who has spent $750,000 on his ascent to real estate nobility, is feeling grand.
“To me, the castle means being able to do something with my life, having financial freedom, being in control,” he says. “It says you’re unique, you’re set aside from the crowd.”
Bond, 53, has dreamed of castle life since his childhood days at an orphanage in Buffalo, N.Y. He says he grew up with a terrible inferiority complex and always wanted to be king of his destiny.
Medieval and Modern
His 4,000-square-foot stucco and stone structure--modest by castle standards--is a blend of the medieval and the modern.
On the roof, of course, are towers--the Towers of Van Nuys, Bond calls them, hoping the name will stick. They are equipped with parapets, those short stone walls with vertical slits for shooting arrows at the enemy.
A narrow swimming pool below Bond’s bedroom balcony will serve as the moat. “A castle has to have a moat,” he says.
And a moat has to be patrolled by alligators, so Bond is having them painted at the bottom of the pool. “When the water ripples, it will look like the alligators are swimming,” he says.
A bridge, also a must, will cross the moat.
Other medieval features include a thick staircase--with a not-so-medieval price tag of $14,000--a front door with heavy iron hardware and a “Great Hall,” where Bond plans to hold concerts and lectures. With a 30-foot ceiling and a large fireplace, the hall is the castle’s centerpiece. It is lined with shelves for the professor’s 4,000 books and will be decorated with colorful banners similar to those attached to the jousting rods of medieval knights. A 5-by-6-foot chandelier will hang from the ceiling.
20th-Century Conveniences
The castle also has a few high-tech features, such as a remote-control device to turn on all the lights and a collapsible TV antenna that can be removed if TV or film companies want to rent the house.
Bond’s home has all the essentials of a medieval castle without the dreary atmosphere. Instead of thick stone walls, it has bay windows and skylights. The architect, Viktor Peteris, says Bond originally wanted an exact replica of a 13th-Century Scottish castle. But Peteris thought that would be a little confining. “I couldn’t justify that in California,” Peteris says. “I just couldn’t see it--so we compromised.”
Bond doesn’t find anything incongruous about building a castle at a busy San Fernando Valley intersection. In fact, he has had his eye on the site for 18 years. He says tree-lined Chandler Boulevard has always been his favorite street in the Valley. When he saw a For Sale sign go up three years ago, he decided to buy the property.
“It’s like being in the country, yet being close to the city,” he says, standing on a balcony above busy Chandler. “It’s a major intersection, so it gives visibility. It’s just perfectly suited.”
Bond plans to defend his castle with an intricate alarm system, but there’s a chance the professor might need more protection from siege. Some of his neighbors wouldn’t mind seeing the castle plundered.
“It’s a monstrosity,” next-door neighbor Rita Rubin says. “It is so out of place. If you want to build a castle, build it in the hills--not on the corner of Fulton and Chandler.”
Other neighbors are on Bond’s side. “I would never have thought of it myself, but I definitely like the feel, the sense of security,” says Linda Cornford, who lives across the street. “I wouldn’t mind other castles. It enhances the whole area.”
Real estate agents say the castle will enhance the value of the houses around it, but they say it is not a great investment for Bond because of the location. In other parts of the Valley the castle could be worth millions, they say.
“I guess it wasn’t the smartest thing” to build on Fulton, says Jennifer Niman, a residential property specialist in the Chandler Estates area. “He’s got to be a little bit nuts to spend that kind of money. If he were going to sell it, that would be kind of difficult. But he’s doing it for his pure enjoyment, so let him enjoy it.”
Bond, who financed the project with money from his financial consulting business and books he has written, says he plans to live in his castle the rest of his life. He says he wouldn’t sell it, even for $2 million. He says he already has rejected an offer for $1.1 million.
For several months while the house was being built, Bond and his girlfriend, Nancy Oliva, lived more like medieval castle dwellers than they will when the house is finished--without lights, heat and hot water.
Oliva says the castle has been an inspiration to their friends. “It’s telling people that dreams are possible, that they can have control over their destiny,” she says. “It’s almost poignant.”
