An iconic property that has been described as presumably “the best home in Southern California” simply hit the marketplace for the primary time ever in Pacific Palisades. Asking value: $11.5 million.
A Midcentury masterpiece, the house served as the first residence of Ray Kappe, the late architect who co-founded the Southern California Institute of Structure (SCI-Arc). He designed the place himself in 1967.
Kappe died in 2019, and his spouse Shelly, who additionally co-founded SCI-Arc, died final yr. Now, the property is being bought by their household belief.
Tucked on a hillside within the Rustic Canyon neighborhood, the home floats above a pure spring that flows by way of the property, resting on six concrete columns sunk 30 ft into the bottom. The 4,157-square-foot flooring plan is break up throughout seven ranges, that includes 5 bedrooms, 5 bogs and free-flowing dwelling areas wrapped in redwood and glass.
One critic known as it “a managed explosion of area.” An architect known as it “the quintessential treehouse.” In 2008, when the L.A. Instances House part created an inventory of the 10 finest homes in L.A., which featured creations from Richard Neutra, Frank Lloyd Wright and Pierre Koenig, former American Institute of Architects’ L.A. chapter president Stephen Kanner mentioned Kappe’s “would be the biggest home in Southern California.”
The Sixties dwelling floats on a hillside lot in Rustic Canyon.
(Cameron Carothers)
It’s not a home that may very well be constructed right now — for a handful of causes. First, the hovering stairs and footbridges that navigate the property haven’t any handrails, which are actually required beneath present development code.
Additionally, the home incorporates a ton of glass. An excessive amount of glass, in response to fashionable California constructing code. The house’s skylights, clerestories and towering home windows that take within the wooded scene surrounding it make up roughly 50% of the ground plan — a lot increased than fashionable limits permit.
Outdoors, cantilevered decks and platforms overlook a lap pool, spa, sauna and cabana shrouded in eucalyptus, sycamore, oak and bamboo.
The 4,157-square-foot home is wrapped in concrete, redwood and glass.
(Cameron Carothers)
The tip result’s a putting area that feels fully distinctive, even in a area as architecturally eclectic as Southern California. In 1996, it was deemed an L.A. Historic-Cultural Monument.
Ian Brooks of Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices California Properties holds the itemizing. He mentioned calls asking to tour the property have been coming nonstop because it surfaced on the market.
“The Kappe residence will resonate with discerning consumers who worth architectural provenance, impeccable design and cultural significance — a uncommon alternative to personal a permanent piece of architectural historical past,” he mentioned.
