The 1924 Ennis House was severely damaged in the 1994 Northridge earthquake. Stabilizing it has cost $6.5 million.
(Kirk Mckoy/Los Angeles Times via Associated Press)
In preservation bid, Wright's Ennis House for sale for $15m
The 1924 Ennis House was severely damaged in the 1994 Northridge earthquake. Stabilizing it has cost $6.5 million.
(Kirk Mckoy/Los Angeles Times via Associated Press)
Los Angeles Times
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June 20, 2009
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LOS ANGELES - Frank Lloyd Wright’s Ennis House, a hilltop masterpiece that has been threatened by man and Mother Nature, is being offered for sale at $15 million by the private foundation that has been restoring it.
Eric Lloyd Wright, the architect’s grandson and a member of the nonprofit Ennis House Foundation’s board, said that, given economic realities, private ownership would be the best way to save the house and honor his grandfather’s intentions.
Completed in 1924 for Charles and Mabel Ennis, the owners of a men’s clothing store, the house was the last and largest of four homes that Wright designed in an experimental “textile block’’ style.
Mabel Ennis sold the house in 1936, and it has changed hands several times since.
In 1968, Augustus O. Brown, the last private owner, bought the estate for $119,000 and made extensive repairs. In 1980, he donated the property to a nonprofit trust he established to ensure that the house would be maintained. That group became the Ennis House Foundation.
The estate, which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, has been featured in films including “House on Haunted Hill,’’ “Grand Canyon’’ and the futuristic “Blade Runner.’’
A new owner would face a projected bill of $5 million to $7 million to restore the house to its former grandeur, atop $6.5 million the foundation already has invested to stabilize the property and begin restoration.
© Copyright 2009 Globe Newspaper Company.
