The only oceanside home ever designed by the iconic architect Frank Lloyd Wright has just been sold for a whopping US$22 million.
Known as the Mrs. Clinton Walker House, the property in California’s Carmel-by-the-Sea was designed for the artist Della Walker in 1952, according to the Wall Street Journal, which first reported the sale. The 1,400-square-foot home had remained privately owned by the Walker family until this purchase.
As is the theme for all of Wright’s architectural designs, the Mrs. Clinton Walker House was built to reflect harmony between nature and humanity. The actual building — which is constructed on a triangular piece of land — was designed to resemble a ship on the crux of the area’s rocky shoreline.
Also called the Cabin on the Rocks, the California home took five years to build. Much of the single-storey home is made from cedar wood, granite boulders, Carmel Stone and glass. Almost every room in the home has a view of the Pacific Ocean, including the charming hexagonal living room, which features a giant floor-to-ceiling fireplace.
The roof is low and wide, tiled with blue-green baked-enamel shingles to match the nearby ocean waves. The property also includes a small beach, according to the Wall Street Journal.
During construction, the entire lot was reportedly lowered more than one metre to better conceal the home amid its rocky surroundings.
Wright, who died in 1959, agreed to design the home after Walker wrote him a letter asking him to create the oceanfront home.
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“I am a woman living alone – I wish protection from the wind and privacy from the road and a house as enduring as the rocks but as transparent and charming as the waves and delicate as the seashore,” Walker wrote, as per the Wall Street Journal.
Walker, the widow of a wealthy lumber executive, felt Wright was the only man who could execute her vision.
As was usually the way with Wright, he was loath to make changes to his original design, even in the name of functionality. Walker’s great-grandson said she reportedly fought with Wright to get a door in the home’s tiny kitchen that would allow her to take out the trash. Though the door was eventually installed, Wright felt it would “destroy the integrity” of the home’s hexagonal grid.
Esperanza Carmel LLC, a real estate investment and development firm, purchased the Mrs. Clinton Walker House. It was sold by descendants of Walker, who were represented by Canning Properties Group with Sotheby’s International Realty.
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