Friday, July 31, 2009

Natasha Bedingfield Buys a Better Place in Los Angeles

BUYER: Natasha Bedingfield
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $2,300,000
SIZE: 4,792 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 5.5 bathrooms
DESCRIPTION: ...Limestone and walnut flooring casts notes of elegance and luxury throughout this sleek, freshly-"done", pristine Modern villa behind the gates of storied Laughlin Park. There's room enough for all: 4 bedrooms; 5.5 baths; media & family rooms; bar; gym; office; detached guest house over 3-car garage with gated motor court; swimmer's pool; spa; luxuriant foliage everywhere.

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: We don't listen to much mainstream pop music so Your Mama wouldn't know a song by the Jonas Brothers or that too-big-for-her-britches Miley Cyrus gurl if it came and knocked on our front door and said, "Hi, I'm a pop song." However, every now and again we catch wind a song playing on some radio station in some shop somewhere and it enters our lexicon of auditory guilty pleasures. Included on that list is anything by Neil Diamond, Christina Aguilera's Beautiful and British songbird Natasha Bedingfield's Pocketful of Sunshine. We cain't help it, that song just tickles the marrow in our bones and we love singing it at the top of our lungs right along with Miss Bedingfield.

Anyhoo, this is all a roundabout way of letting the children know that the Grammy nominated Miss Bedingfield recently forked over $2,300,000 for a new crib in Los Angeles. Presumably this is the residence where Miss Bedingfield will live in wedded bliss with her new documentary filmmaker huzband Matt Robinson. Located in the historic and gated Laughlin Park neighborhood in Los Feliz, Miss Bedingfield's new West Coast domicile measures in at 4,792 square feet and includes 5 bedrooms and 4.5 poopers in the main house and another terlit in the (approx.) 400 square foot guest house that sits atop the 3-car garage and next to the swimming pool.

The property was first listed way back in January of 2008 with an optimistic asking price of $4,495,000. However, with no buyers willing to pay that price and the real estate market sinking like quicksand, the asking price was sliced and diced all the way down to $2,495,000 before Mister and Missus Bedingfield swooped in and snatched it up for $2,300,000.

The home is entered on the top floor where the front door opens directly into the limestone floored open plan living, dining, and kitchen area. The living room space includes a fireplace and opens through two wood-framed sliding glass doors to a slim balcony overlooking the backyard two full floors below. The recently rehabbed kitchen has been fitted with blond striated wood cabinetry topped with some sort of white counter top that may or may not be Corian or Ceasarstone. All the appliances look sufficiently high end and Euro including the double ovens and the cook top with the parabolic glass and stainless steel venting hood.

At one end of the living room is a small bedroom (that does not appear to have a closet) and a pooper and shower for guests. At the other end is one of two master suites which includes a lengthy 30-foot long bedroom, a bedroom-sized custom fitted walk-in closet and a limestone, glass and tile pooper done up in every shade of beige known to mankind. One flight of stairs leads down to a family room with a second modern and mantel-free fireplace, another slim balcony accessed through a pair of wood-framed sliding glass doors, and some gor-gee-us walnut wood flooring. Honestly chickens, we'd have preferred to see this walnut flooring on the top floor as well. We think it would have anchored the otherwise gauzy and monochromatic rooms that are going to take a skilled and nice gay decorator to warm and cozy up. A second, smaller master bedroom with a good sized pooper and a walk in closet sits at one of the family room at at the other two additional bedrooms share a bathroom. One of the bedrooms is long, narrow, oddly configured and, unfortunately, must be passed through to get to the laundry room making it only usable as a storage space, craft room or perhaps an office. No child or guest needs the homeowner's laundress tramping through their bedroom in order to do a load of whites.

One more flight of stairs goes down to a media room and bar that share a half pooper. The high ceilinged media room has been wallpapered in grass cloth (good for the acoustics?) and opens to a narrown terrace that spills down to the simple and pretty rectangular swimming pool and spa that has a simple limestone coping surrounded by a patch of unnaturally green grass. Thank heavens for the adjacent guest house and pooper because Your Mama would surely have a damn heart attack getting back up to one of the guest rooms to do our dirty bidness. Iffin we were Mister and Missus Bedingfield, which of course we are not, we'd install an illegal kitchen in that guest house so that we could keep a poolside stash of gin, tonic, limes, ice and candy. We'd also stick a day bed in there because after a long afternoon paddling around in the pool with a tumbler of booze we'd be hard pressed to make up back up all them stairs without busting up our ankle or breaking our damn neck. But Miss Bedingfield is young, fit and nimble so we don't imagine that will be a problem for her or her new Mister.

Even more stairs lead down from the pool deck to the walled and gated motor court. It's really lovely to have a three car garage and a motor court to park 3 or 4 more automobilies, but let's be honest, who's going to park down there when it's four lung busting and glute ripping flights of stairs up to the main living spaces? Not Your Mama nor the Dr. Cooter and certainly not our demanding house gurl Svetlana who would insist we install a funicular to haul the groceries up from the back of her vintage Datsun B-210.

The lovely and leafy Laughlin Park neighborhood has long been favored by famous folks and previous residents have includes such luminaries as Cecil B. DeMille, W.C. Fields, Charlie Chaplin and Carole Lombard. Nowadays, residents include Tinseltown types like Jenna and Bodhi Elfman, and Casey Affleck and Summer Phoenix, and Natalie Portman who recently dumped $3,250,000 on a nearby house with a long history of celebrity ownership.

Welcome to Hollywood Miss Bedingfield.

15 comments:

Anonymous said...

The two stories between the pool and the principal rooms would be a deal breaker for me. I find this house absolutely bland and without character.

How much money do you have to spend in Los Angeles to live without these kind of compromises?

stolidog said...

A Datsun B-210! Memory Lane. My second ever car, and I used to drive drunk all over St. Louis in it while in college.

Thanks Mama, too few memories from way back then.

StPaulSnowman said...

This place needs some sort of focal point. I think we could make everything better with a lifesized bronze nude in that big glass box they have in the bathroom.

Madam Pince said...

a small bedroom (that does not appear to have a closet)

Without a closet, a room can't be listed as a bedroom in my home state of Virginia.

Anonymous said...

Laughlin Park is a gated community without guards at the several entrance gates. Sometimes the gates are open and you can just drive around. Not the best security for celebrity owners.

Unknown said...

Love the B-210 Honeybee - lucky gurl Svetlana.

This is a lot of house for $2.3M. They will enjoy it until the little ones come along and then sell it to the next young couple.

Nancy/PA said...

Besides the Datsun B-210, today's LOL for me was "no child or guest" having to put up with the laundress tramping through their room to do a "load of whites". Love you, Mama! But this has to be one of the blandest houses and weirdest floorplans I've seen.

angie said...

A unique and unusual house that would take some getting used to with the typical arrangement of living and sleeping levels reversed. I found a 51 photo slide show of this property still available.

StPaulSnowman said...

Engelaugen......nice link. Reviewing these photos really brings home how important good photos are when trying to sell a property! I envy your embedding skills.

Belvoir said...

Oh God.. very nice house, but damn, she is a terrible singer. Good for her that she raked the cash, but her voice and songs are ferickin' shrill and unpleasant. I know her songs are used on the teevee shows-"The Hills"?. But dayum, it sticks in my craw to see a blonde girl who can't sing fronting a black gospel choir like in one of her videos. I'll stop now.

Anonymous said...

We saw this house last year. Yes, it is a lot of stairs. The plus side is the house is very light, bright, and has nice views from most rooms. The layout isn't as bad as it may seem. It flows well and would make a great party house.

The front entry of the house (on De Mille) is at kitchen level. There is street parking and maybe one off street space (not 100% sure). I'd dump the groceries up there then put away the car.

PS. Looks like she may have only paid 1.7m

Anonymous said...

Anonymous, I went and saw this house too. The lay out is way too narrow and each level as you go down gets even narrower. It's a lot like condo living.

She didn't pay 1.7, the original owner purchased it for 1.7 and re-did everything, including adding the bottom level of the home, pool, guest house, motorcourt.

We were looking to buy a home in Los Feliz when we went to the open house. The stairs are a huge pain, even if you're in shape. God forbid you forget something on the bottom floor after you walked up to the top. I tried walking straight from the motorcourt up to the top floor and it was really tiring (25 yr old, in shape) Also, there is no real dinning room/area which is a huge deal breaker for us. The house didn't have any attention to detail and no major expenses. You need to get a good interior designer to be able to section off the narrow layout and add some character.

The house was only worth 1.7 to me, owner/builder lost money on this sale, even at 2.3 mill.

Anonymous said...

This house is proof that "comps"/cost per foot only goes so far. The GF and I looked at this house. At first blush, the "cost per foot" is a huge bargain for the 'hood. But, then you have to actually live in the house. Yes, too many stairs/levels. Yes, bland re-do. Finishes good, but not great/expensive. It lacks soul and/or character. Apples to apples, this house looks like a steal compares to the one Ms. Portman bought. Until you tour them both.

Anonymous said...

we looked at this house in all its sad, diminished glory. it is very very cheap construction. already things were chipped, falling apart, etc after a year without any occupants. it also has a crap view (overlooks not the city, but that hideous planned community above los feliz blvd). funny thing: in the kitchen, the oven doors are so low that they open onto the floor (like they literally rest on the floor when you open the thing). 2.3 is waaay to much for this piece of crap. same builder sold a house on edgemont with equally crap construction for something like 3 mil before the bottom dropped out of the market. poor natasha. not too savvy with her money, huh?

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