Liberace’s Secret West Hollywood Townhouse Oozes with Old Hollywood Glamour
Los Angeles is peppered with the haunts, hideouts, and homes of silver screen stars from Hollywood’s Golden Age, when actors and actresses were typically hired on contract by all-powerful film and television studios. To house their stable of up-and-coming leading men, young ingenues and visiting stars, MGM Studios, founded in 1924, built The Shoreham, in West Hollywood.
An elegant, Regency-inspired cluster of fifteen apartments and townhouses completed in 1937, oozing with old Hollywood glamour and serenely set behind iron gates amid tranquil gardens, brick terraces and koi ponds, the immaculately maintained complex is nipped down a cul-de-sac just above the buzzy Sunset Plaza section of the Sunset Strip.
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Tinseltowners who passed through the complex at various stages of their careers include Janet Leigh, Fernando Lamas, Joan Fontaine, Veronica Lake, Marlene Dietrich, and Olivia de Havilland, the latter who lived in at least three different units.
Broadcast journalist Connie Chung once resided in a two-bedroom unit that had many decades earlier been occupied by both Vivian Vance and Farley Granger; Ava Gardner and Katherine Hepburn lived in the same one-bedroom apartment that’s now owned by Madam Secretary actress Kathrine Herzer; and one of the larger townhouses, once owned by Barbara Marx, fourth wife of Frank Sinatra, and in the 1970s the secret hideout of virtuoso pianist and famously flamboyant showman Liberace, is now ready for its next resident.
Anthony Barcelo
Available through Drew Meyers and JJ Meyers of Westside Estate Agency at $2.88 million, the three-bedroom and three-and-a-half bath townhouse was initially listed last year at almost $3.4 million. Unexpectedly topped by a massive terrace, the four-story townhouse retains numerous original architectural detailing such as the herringbone-pattern walnut floors, delicately swagged wrought-iron stair railing, and marble-embellished fireplace (converted to gas).
Stone obelisks top antique brick pillars at the gated entrance to the historic complex. Stone obelisks top antique brick pillars at the gated entrance to the historic complex. Lattice accents and a Chinese lantern-style light fixture at the front door reinforce the eclectic glam of the complex’s Regency style, while plain Doric columns and square pilasters adorn the foyer. And French doors set into a 15-pane window open to a small deck that overlooks a koi pond enshrouded in bamboo and other tropical plantings.
This story originally ran on Dirt.com, which has additional photos.
