Good Questions: MidCentury Neighborhoods in LA?
Los Angeles

Dear AT, I'd like to find a Midcentury modern home in LA and was wondering which neighborhoods in LA have a higher concentration of such homes. I am moving to LA from DC in a month and any help would be much appreciated!

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Although often looked over, the northern LA County neighborhood of Granada Hills has a stunning, if not surprising, enclave of beautiful Eichler and other post war residences in various states of repair and disrepair. We've toured a couple, including Gregory's Palm Springs In the Suburbs and Cindy and Harvey's Eichler Original

Our own area of Silver Lake and the nearby Hollywood Hills has many Midcentury residences, including a notable section of Neutra homes near the Silver Lake reservoir we got to tour inside during a past architectural tour. There are plenty of non-name homes strewn across the hills, and a leisurely driving tour might lead to a discovery that way if you have some time to look around for that needle in the haystack.

Other areas with prominent number of MidCentury homes: Bel-Air, Palisades, Beverly Hills, Encino, Studio City, Altadena, Palos Verdes, Long Beach and Pasadena (and more we're sure we're forgetting). Two of our favourite sites that we use to window shop and daydream of purchasing our first home are SoCal Modern and the much higher echelon of listings, Architecture for Sale. We hope these help you find your MidCentury home here in LA.

Any other recommendations of homes of the MidCentury flavour?

Comments (22)

My neighborhood of Franklin Hills (Or Beachwood Canyon) has quite a few mixed in with all the Spanish Bugalows.

You should also try Larchmont Park...

Many areas of the San Fernando Valley also have MCM homes including homes designed by Palmer and Kriesel.

Balboa Highlands (Eichlers) - Balboa & Lisette in Granada Hills

Try Valleymodern.com for help with San Fernando Valley areas - loads of mid-century houses in the Valley

I live in la crescenta, near Pasadena. It is a great neighborhood, has great prices, and a lot of midcentury modern homes.

you're lucky there are so many spots... we visited socal (from norcal) last summer and snapped pix of every eichler in the LA area (north and south)... take a peek. also check out lottaliving.com for a good forum of MCM goodness...

Does anyone know where the rug in the top picture (with the orange & green furniture) could be from?

i don't know what your budget is, but when it comes to bang for your buck, the cliff may ranchos in long beach can't be beat.

I was going to say the Eichler's in Granada Hills as well

Good luck finding one on the market!

There is an Eichler in Granada Hills on the market right now, somewhere in the mid-500's too.

Second the vote for Cliff May rancho in Long Beach. Here is another website to include in your search, mostly Long Beach: http://www.ranchostyle.com/index.html

I live on Beachwood, too.... there are some really nice places at the top of the hill. My place is very retro, mid-century. Besides, it's a great place to live.

The Valley is loaded with them. Think: 1950's-60's suburbia. It was moslty agricultual (citrus, tomatoes, etc. My house sits on a former walnut grove) until the home building boom of the 50's. My little neigborhood (ca 1950) was inspired by Levitt Town.

Granada Hills, Woodland Hills, Northridge, Valley Village are great places to start....and, there are plenty of good deals (read: foreclosures and short sales) everywhere.
Good Luck!

There's the 1948 Gregory Ain tract in Mar Vista: http://www.marvistatract.org/

Village Green in LA. Though it's more the utopian-design-better-living-for-the-people modernism as opposed to expensive-furniture-store modernism. But it's much more centrally located than some of the other suburban neighborhoods and cheap.

http://bigorangelandmarks.blogspot.com/2008/08/no-174-village-green.html

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/la/complex-love/complex-love-village-green-baldwin-hills-village-029541

The Palms and Rose block of Mar Vista. Every blue moon an MCM comes up for sale or rent however this occurance is very very rare. Like sighting a centaur in the bike lane kind of rare.

The Monterey Hills area of South Pasadena has lots of pristine mid-century homes with the added bonus of expansive views of Downtown and the San Gabriel Valley.

Oh what a wonderful dream. You can do it up all period and fab. Color me jeal-ous!

While more pricey than some of the areas listed above, there are many beautiful mid-century homes in Laurel and Nichol's Canyon.

North Hills/Granada Hills

compared to DC, I would say just about everywhere. Silverlake / Eagle Rock / Washington Heights

In my very long ago past life I worked with Crosby Doe- if you have some big cash here is the best real estate firm -
http://www.architectureforsale.com/agentpage.php?aid=14&listing=ok#listing

Gregory Ain Mar Vista is a good call, close to Venice Beach, Santa Monica and the airport great local. You can find pockets of mid century all over like Studio City has a great apartment complex off Ventura Blvd on Lauralwood Drive - Schindler's and its far enough back off Ventura Blvd and the complex is shaded by lots of trees so it does not get that awfeful heat like most of the valley. Its not on the Landmark register yet.
Lots off Laural Canyon.

Most affordable at this point would be Mt. Washington, Eagle Rock area but you are sucking uo some bad air.

Living in LA does not mean great house but it does mean great location. Who wants to sit on the freeway and breath bad air for good architecture? Yes i did but no more, I did wear high heels back then too.

there is so much here. live close to where you work. really. do that. a lot of us now day dream living in apartments... there is a midcentury, well 60's, gem on Whitley in the heart of Hollywood up from the renascent boulevard of that name, called the Ardmore... always showing, not a bad place to land until you can really suss out YOUR LA, I call it the Big Onion, so many layers, they never run out.

welcome