pierre koenig's case study house 21 in los angeles on sale for $3.6m

a classic piece of los angeles’ architectural history is for sale in the hollywood hills. dubbed the bailey house — or case study house 21 — this modernist masterpiece was conceived by architect pierre koenig and is on the market for a total of $3.6 million american dollars. built between 1956 and 1958, the two-bedroom residential property was home to design gallery seomi international exhibitions in the past years.

all images via pacific union LA

in 1945, arts & architecture magazine announced the case study house program (CSHP). the initiative was envisioned as a creative response to the imminent building boom expected to follow the housing shortages of the great depression and world war II. john entenza, editor and publisher of the magazine, encouraged the participant architects to donate materials from industry and manufacturers to create low-cost, modern housing prototypes that would stimulate a dialogue between architectural professionals and laymen.

after seeing koenig’s hands-on experience with steel construction, entenza invited the architect to participate in the CSHP program and design a house for psychologist walter bailey and his wife mary, a couple described by arts & architecture magazine as a contemporary-minded duo with no children and an informal lifestyle. this resulted in the ideal program for pierre koenig to use his steel knowledge and build a truly open plan design that takes advantage of the extensive spans that steel facilitated.

in 1969, the bailey’s relocated to the east coast and had to put case study house #21 for sale. shamefully, for the next thirty years, the house saw a succession of owners with weak commitments to maintenance and preservation, who did numerous renovations upon the original design. in 1997, film producer dan cracchiolo expressed his interest in the house and bought it for $1.5 million. a purist himself, the house went through a new meticulous restoration to bring it back to its original state. today, the case study house #21 is registered as a los angeles historic-cultural monument.

CSH #21 is lay out along a north-south axis with a fully-glazed south façade that takes advantage of the sunlight and the views. the L-shaped plan establishes a linear progression from the car port and entry through the living space and out to the garden. when describing the mass-produced prototype, koenig said, ‘I was trying to develop a 1,300 square feet (120 m2) house in an efficient, social, and exciting plan that people could afford… I had thrown out all conventional thought because I had no patience with anything that had been done before.’