Case Study architect Edward Killingsworth’s Long Beach home on the market for $3.3M

A designer of four of the 24 homes built for Arts and Architecture’s Case Study House program, Edward Killingsworth first came to the attention of the magazine’s editor, John Entenza, after Entenza drove past a 743-square-foot residence and office in Los Alamitos that Killingsworth had designed for his in-laws in 1950.

In 1961, the architect designed another home, this one for his own family, with that “stop the car” quality. Were the arresting residence not located within the gated confines of Long Beach’s exclusive Virginia Country Club, it may very well have incited a few pile-ups over the years. Now the Killingsworth House has come up for sale for the first time ever, predictably inciting a bidding war.

Sited on a .7-acre lot overlooking the country club’s golf course, the home presents an impressive facade, with a pair of oversize iron lanterns fit for a medieval castle adorning the walls at its entry. There’s even a modernist nod to a moat in the form of an elongated water feature that splits the red brick path leading to the house.

Suitably fortified against uninvited intrusion, the elegant sanctuary freely welcomes nature and light in with endless expanses of glass, slotted-wood atrium ceilings, and multiple skylights. Other architectural elements include 12-foot ceilings, a “floating” fireplace, sliding room dividers, wood-paneled walls, brick floors, and custom built-ins.

Listed with Crosby Doe and Gordon Newsom for an asking price of $3.3 million, the architecturally significant property has just gone under contract; backup offers, however, are still being considered.