In Beverly Hills, The Legendary Chimorro House, $22M

We’re not exactly sure who Mrs. Chimorro was (or even her first name) but in 1926 she commissioned this house from Roy Selden Price, one of LA’s most successful architects of the period—referred to in David Gebhard and Robert Winter’s magisterial An Architectural Guidebook to Los Angeles as “one of the most gifted of Los Angeles Period Revival architects of the 1920s.” We do know Mrs. Chimorro was a friend of Charlie Chaplin (who would later commission Price to design a house for Lita Grey, his second wife) and she must have had quite the social life—anecdotally, the house once had a tunnel leading directly to the nearby Beverly Hills Hotel, always a handy amenity when throwing big alcohol-infused parties during Prohibition.

Secret escape routes aside, what’s on offer here is one of the loveliest Spanish Revival dwellings in a town overflowing with them, impeccably reworked by its current owner, the British impresario/agent Mark Gillespie, CEO of the global entertainment management company, Three Six Zero. Keeping secure from the authorities during Prohibition was paramount, so access to the property is through a splendidly outscale set of gates with the obligatory guardhouse, and beyond the paved courtyard lies a beautifully proportioned 6-bed, 7-bath home on almost a half-acre, still hewing closely to the spirit of Price’s original romantic vision.

For such an extraordinary property, video tells the story best.

Go to the listing for additional images and details. The Chimorro House presents an exceptional opportunity to acquire not only a piece of Beverly Hills’ Prohibition and film industry heritage, but a significant work of domestic architecture by one of the era’s best practitioners, represented by Eric Lavey and his team at Sotheby’s International Realty. 

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