Swedish designer Greta Magnusson Grossman is best known for her furniture and other home decor, but she also was one of the very few women designing lovely modern houses in mid-century Los Angeles (she fled Sweden with her husband/bandleader Billy Grossman in the early 1940s). Her largest house, and the "most interesting," according to Forum (pdf), is the Hurley Residence in Lake Hollywood and next month it'll hit the market for the first time since it was built in 1958. It's 2,700 square feet, expanded from its original 2,000 (with a lower-level guest suite), and has four bedrooms, four bathrooms, and a study; Grossman designed everything inside (well, not quite, maybe--the 2009 Forum story says "The living-room is still populated by chairs and a couch by T.H. Robsjohn-Gibbins.").
According to a press release from listing agents the Beachwood Team, "Taking the commission for this 'problem lot', which many other architects had turned down as 'unbuildable', [Grossman] designed a cantilevered structure with caissons that left sufficient room for a pool and surrounding patio on the only level area of the site." She came up with a "low slung flat roofed design" with "lean modern rectilinear pavilions" and glass walls. The Hurley also has a floating travertine fireplace, patio, and a kidney pool "the same kidney shape as Grossman's first American-made sofa," says Forum.
The Hurleys lived in the house until their deaths in 2009 and 2013, respectively. Their house, which appeared in the October 1960 issue of Arts & Architecture, will be listed for $1.795 million.
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