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$1.25 Million Homes in California, Louisiana and Illinois
A sculptural concrete house in Santa Cruz County, an 1880 Victorian in New Orleans and a converted 19th-century fire station in Highland Park.
Dec. 23, 2020
Updated 11:40 a.m. ET
What You Get for $1.25 Million
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Brent Black
La Selva Beach, Calif. | $1.25 MillionA sculptural concrete house built in the early 1970s, with one bedroom and one bathroom, on a 4,792-square-foot lot with ocean viewsIn 1972, Mary Gordon, a landscape architect, designed an organic concrete house near the beach in an unincorporated area of Santa Cruz County, which she intended to use as retirement quarters for herself and her husband. Constructed by boat builders — with tubular forms protruding from a rounded base, including a windowed cylinder emerging from the top like a periscope — the house ultimately became Ms. Gordon’s studio and a showplace for her gardening talents. Seven years ago, it was sold to a second owner, who made it homier by adding a stainless-steel spiral staircase inside and improving the kitchen and bathroom.
The closest town for supermarkets and schools is Aptos, about five miles northwest, to the east of Route 1. Seascape Beach Resort offers restaurants and shops about two miles up the coast by car (or a shorter distance if you walk along the beach).
Size: 700 square feet
Price per square foot: $1,786
Indoors: The house is entered through double glass doors at the ground level, while an exterior staircase coils around the girth of the building, rising to a balcony off the bedroom upstairs.
Inside, at the base of the house, is a living room with arched windows and concrete floors. A built-in floating wood bench with cushions and integrated storage curves around one of the white concrete walls, next to a wood-burning fireplace (plumbed with gas).
The bathroom is between the living room and kitchen. It has a circular soaking tub with a private view of the garden, a tiled shower and a toilet room with a concrete-topped wood vanity.
The same cabinetry wraps the kitchen, where there is a Wolf cooktop and double Bertazzoni oven. The kitchen pantry includes a stacked Bosch washer and dryer.
The upper level is devoted to the bedroom and its protuberances, including a carpeted volume described as a “crow’s nest,” with ocean views. The periscope used to include a ladder that the owner climbed for additional ocean gazing; it currently holds a pendant light and a ceiling fan. The bed includes six drawers for storage.
Outdoor space: The property is entered through a gate with bloblike cutouts set into a rustic picket fence. There are fronded plants, blooming bushes, variegated ground cover and citrus trees along the gravel paths, as well as a storage shed. Along the west side of the lot, holly trees screen the property from its neighbors. The driveway accommodates two cars in tandem.
Taxes: $15,625 (estimated), plus an annual $100 homeowner association fee for private beach access
Contact: Nanette Schuster, David Lyng Real Estate, 831-840-0138; davidlyng.com
Enjoli LeCour
New Orleans | $1.25 MillionAn 1880 Victorian with four bedrooms and two and a half bathrooms, on a 5,800-square-foot double lot with a swimming poolThis house is on Royal Street in the Marigny district, two doors east of Franklin Avenue, a commercial corridor with several popular restaurants and bars. Crescent Park and the Mississippi River are three blocks away. The neighborhood’s elevation, at the edge of the engineered bowl in which New Orleans sits, has protected it from severe flood damage in past hurricanes, including Katrina.
The house is traditionally designed, with stacked, columned porches and tall shutters; a wrought-iron balcony; and a side gallery overlooking the swimming pool.
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Size: 3,506 square feet
Price per square foot: $357
Indoors: The current owner bought the house in 2010 and undertook two renovations — the second after a fire damaged the rear portion in 2012. The plumbing and electricity have been updated, and the roof is eight years old.
To the right of the entrance hall is a double parlor with heart-pine floors. Its twin fireplaces, which have classical mantels and vintage iron covers, are not operable. The seller liked the timeworn look of the degraded ceiling medallions and crown molding, but they could easily be restored to their original condition.
Beyond the parlor is a formal dining room with a nonfunctioning brick fireplace in a windowed bay. The kitchen looks out to the side courtyard and pool. The seller, who worked as a chef, renovated it with lower cabinets topped in tile and upper cabinets that have translucent doors. A half bathroom next to the kitchen is convenient to the pool area, through a back door. The home also has a rear staircase.
The heart-pine floors continue on the second level. The two street-facing bedrooms have decorative fireplaces and walk out to the wraparound balcony through floor-to-ceiling windows. The two rear bedrooms open to the gallery overlooking the pool. Even a bathroom that connects to the hallway and to one of the front bedrooms has access to outdoor space. (A second full bathroom is at the back.) Many of the exterior and interior doors have transom windows, allowing light to wash through the house.
Outdoor space: The heated pool is saltwater; an outdoor shower with hot and cold water is behind a fence in back. Plantings include palms, ginger and a fragrant eruption of rosemary near the kitchen door. A rolling gate slides back to allow a single car to park on the property.
Taxes: $3,684 (based on a tax assessment of $44,340)
Contact: Michael Bain, Dorian Bennett Sotheby’s International Realty, 504-944-3605; sothebysrealty.com
Highland Park, Ill. | $1.25 MillionA five-bedroom, four-and-a-half-bathroom house on 0.31 acres, converted from a fire station that was part of a 19th-century cavalry fortFort Sheridan, a United States cavalry fort built in the 1880s and 1890s to designs by Holabird & Roche (now Holabird & Root), was decommissioned in 1993, and a portion of the 632-acre site was developed as a residential enclave with access to parkland and 1.5 miles of frontage on Lake Michigan. This property, the fort’s 1895 fire station, was among the historic buildings retrofitted into single-family houses.
The house is in Highland Park, a suburb about 20 miles north of Chicago. Typical of the original structures, which include barracks, stables and a 14-story water tower next to this property, it was solidly built with yellow Cream City bricks manufactured in Milwaukee with earth scooped from local ravines. The Fort Sheridan Metra station, with regular commuter train service, is less than a mile northwest (travel time to the Chicago Loop is about an hour). Highland Park’s business district is about three miles south.
Size: 5,400 square feet
Price per square foot: $231
Indoors: The entrance hall is on the east side of the house. It passes between a dining room on the left and an office and powder room on the right before arriving at the jewel of the property: the original engine room, now a 1,000-square-foot living room with exposed-brick walls and a vaulted, beadboard ceiling. Double glass doors are set into the room’s two prominent bays, and the flooring here, and throughout the main level, has radiant heat.
The living room and dining room connect separately to the kitchen. A central island divides that space into a work area with two walls of granite-topped cabinetry, high-end appliances and a glass-mosaic-tile backsplash, and a breakfast area with a wood- and gas-burning fireplace. Nearby is a guest room with an en suite bathroom, and next to that, a utility room. The rear mudroom, which has a second refrigerator-freezer, leads directly to a new, three-bay garage that matches the main building.
There are no thresholds in any of the wide room entrances on this floor, making the home workable for wheelchair access or for aging in place.
Four bedrooms are on the second floor, including a master suite, in a new addition. The suite includes a dressing niche with a pair of walk-in closets and a terrazzo bathroom with twin vanities, a jetted tub and a glass-walled shower. Two additional bathrooms with walk-in closets share a Jack-and-Jill bathroom. The fourth bedroom connects to a bathroom that also has hallway access.
Outdoor space: A brick area in front of the house provides direct access to the mudroom, and from there to the garage. On the other side is a patio. Beyond the breakfast area is a large deck that overlooks a ravine, with a built-in bench around the perimeter. The house is next to a community playground and near the fort’s parade grounds. Bike paths, cross-country ski trails and private beaches are all nearby.
Taxes: $23,544 (2019), plus a quarterly $432 homeowner fee
Contact: Paul Dincin or Lisa Callahan, Catapult Real Estate, 312-320-6685; agreatertown.com
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