Monday, October 3, 2011

Frances Bean Cobain Buys A West Coast Crib of Her Own




BUYER: Frances Bean Cobain
LOCATION: Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,825,000
SIZE: 3,350 square feet, 4 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Last week Your Mama received an enlightening missive from The Bizzy Boys at Celebrity Address Aerial who alerted us to a well-maintained Los Angeles, CA residence they believe was acquired–through a trust–by tatted-up teen-aged rock-and-roll heiress Frances Bean Cobain.

In case any of y'all live under a showbiz rock and don't know, Miss Cobain, now a quite striking and decidedly worldly 19 year old young woman, is the only progeny of deceased Nirvana front man Kurt Cobain, who (in)famously did himself in when his daughter was just a toddler, and Hole front woman Courtney Love, a not-particularly-stable-seeming twittering typhoon of a woman who can be counted on as rich fodder for the tabs, blogs and gossip glossies but but isn't, we imagine, on any body's list for Mother of the Year.

Miz Love and Miss Cobain have a wickedly cantankerous mother/daughter relationship. In late 2009 it was widely reported that Miz Love lost legal custody of her minor daughter and that a temporary restraining order was issued that forbid Momma Love from having any direct or indirect contact with Miss Cobain.

On the occasion of her 18th birthday in August 2010, Miss Cobain not only became a legal adult but also the sole beneficiary of a multi-million dollar trust set up in the years after her father's suicide to ensure her future financial security. Now in control of her very own and very substantial mountain of moolah, the former Rolling Stone intern turned pseudonymic artist Fiddle Tim, has indeed busted out and bought herself a home of her own in Tinseltown.

After getting word of the purchase from The Bizzy Boys, Your Mama did some asking around and our frighteningly well-informed friend and informant Lucy Spillerguts quickly confirmed the purchase by Miss Cobain of a vintage Spanish style casa tucked into a quiet canyon in the foothills just above Hollywood. Property records show the deal went down in late July 2011 in the amount of $1,825,000.

Listing information for Miss Cobain's new crib shows it measures a grown up but far from excessive 3,350 square feet with a total of 4 bedrooms and 3.5 bathrooms. The two-story house, built in 1930, was designed by architect Carl Jules Weyl and retains many original architectural and decorative details such as hand-forged iron work, colorful decorative tiles, numerous stained and leaded glass windows, hand-stenciled wood beams, and vintage light fixtures and hardware.

The terra cotta tile floors in the entrance hall turn to restored wood floors in the "formal" living room that features a wood-burning fireplace, vaulted wood ceiling with exposed and stenciled beams, a row of leaded glass windows at the front of the house and a bank of pane-free French doors that open the room to a large tiled terrace at the rear of the property.

Like the entrance hall, the formal dining room has an articulated ceiling treatment and connects to the kitchen/service area through an old-timey swinging door. The fully updated and upgraded kitchen isn't huge but is well-equipped with white Shaker-style cabinetry, open shelving for daily dishes and glassware, high-grade commercial-style stainless steel appliances, and white subway tile back splashes. The kitchen complex also includes a long and narrow walk-in pantry with washer and dryer and an adjoining breakfast room with shallow barrel vaulted ceiling.

A room next to the kitchen is labeled as a "Media Rm" in the listing description of the property but is so exiguous that even a committed and unashamed tee-vee addict like Your Mama would rather scrub terlits with an old toothbrush than be trapped in that claustrophobic cubicle of a room with a blaring boob-toob.

Anyhoo, the wood-floored staircase winds up to the second floor bedrooms that include a modestly-scaled but nicely appointed master bedroom that listing information indicates includes a small private terrace, a wonderfully cacophonous tiled bathroom with separate soaking tub and stall shower, "generous closets," and a separate dressing area charmingly outfitted with built-in vanity and adjustable three-sided mirror.

Although the rear yard is, as per listing information, "pool-sized" there isn't a swimming pool. There are several outdoor areas where Miss Cobain can take advantage of the classic (and somewhat cliché) indoor/outdoor California lifestyle. The main dining/lounging and outdoor entertaining area is a tree-shaded, courtyard-like patio accessible through French doors located in various rooms on the main floor of the residence. A short, gated driveway cuts along the side of house and leads back to a detached garage currently converted to a studio/office.

It unclear how much time Miss Cobain plans to spend in Los Angeles given that she reportedly attends private, pricey and proudly arty-farty Bard College in upstate New York.

Your Mama asks that the children keep in mind that the perfectly banal day-core depicted in listing photographs reflect the tastes of the seller and not Miss Cobain who we imagine (and hope) has far less traditional and more quirky ideas about how to turn a house into a home.

listing photos: Prudential California Realty

22 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good for Miss Cobain.

I like the TV nook room. It reminds me of the TV room at my grandparent's, where a daybed, chair & footstool surrounded a 13" - remember those days? I can't imagine a family gathered around a laptop/iPad screen in twenty eleven.

Lady J

Anonymous said...

Oh my heavens. A boring house and a boring person. Let us move on to something and somebody else pronto. There must be juicier fish to fry out there somewhere.

Anonymous said...

very pretty. i hope she doesn't mess with the bathrooms.

fyi, the word verification for the post is "unflu". lol.

hope you and the doc are feeling better.

FonHom said...

I love it.

God bless whoever did the reno, update and/or maintenance. Even the light fixtures complement the period & style (read: no pointless ceiling carpet of spots.) It would be nice to have more privacy in the front, but this is a great house for the price.

You're right about the long narrow "media room" Mama. I'd make it the dining room. Current LR is next to the entrance so it should stay as is. If she really needs a dedicated "media room" then the current DR might be it...my nice gay decorator and I would have to get together on that.

If Ms. Cobain is the buyer, girlfriend has taste. Welcome to the neighborhood (if I lived there)!

Little Miss Smoke and Mirrors said...

I'm with anon @1140. I hope she leaves that bathroom unfettered.

Little Miss Smoke and Mirrors said...

I just found the place on redfin. It has another bathroom with vintage tile intact. I really hope she appreciates it. I have no idea why I'm so protective of that tile! #sickness

Anonymous said...

Thank-Goodnes she has more taste than her Mama

E.J. said...

Weyl was an art director for the studios; very successful and one of his credits was the design work for Casablanca. Interesting guy, actually.

Anonymous said...

Am I the only one who feels old hearing Francis is 19 years old?? Her father was such a beautiful, talented, and tortured man. Mom is a much reported mess of epic proportion. With that DNA in her, Francis is going to need all of the hope she can get.

Anonymous said...

It's so easy to be an artist when your deceased parent leaves you millions of dollars in a trust fund, isn't it?

Anonymous said...

Good thing Courtney isn't web-savvy enough to locate this address...

Anonymous said...

Shanah Tovah to Mama, Dr. Cooter, Mama Cooter and the Children, Svetlana, Linda and Beverly, and Sugar Puss, too! And I hope that the good doctor is on the mend.

The new Cobain home has beautiful and classic California details: curvaceous iron railings and light fixtures, intricately leaded windows, handsome ceilings, spectacular tiles on the stair side and in the bathroom, and a marvelous red clay roof. This home has potential and a positive prognosis for comfort and style.

May the New year of 5772 bring health and prosperity to Mama, her family and the Children, a just peace to the Middle East and the world, and lots of real estate scoop, especially in the old countries of Trenton, Brooklyn, Brookline, and maybe even Manhattan.

Rabbi Hedda, Studly, Rodney, Verandah and Patti
Trenton NJ

Rosco Mare said...

To Anon 1:54
You're not alone! I was thinking, "didn't I just see Courtney pushing her in a stroller in Sunset Plaza?" I vividly remember the news of the suicide while having dinner at Nate N Al, where the general consensus was, "what a fool."

Beautiful house. Hopefullly she won't do something to it like paint it black.

Anonymous said...

Beautiful home inside and out!

Ayana said...

Beautiful house!

midTN said...

***

A charming old house....I too love that bathroom...

...now if Frances can just get her hot mess of a mama placed in a "home"...

***

Anonymous said...

I love it! her father would be proud of her independence and her love of music and arts. When she is done with school it won't just be a summer home. It will be that special place she can truly feel at home. The girl deserves it. I hate how everyone assumes that the heiress must be happy. I lost my dad when I was very young... he may not have left me a fortune but I know if he had I would trade it all to have him. I am sure she would do the same.
Good luck to her... I hope I can hang a Cobain above my fire place someday.

Anonymous said...

I will never understand people's fascination with Kurt Cobain...he wasn't a musical genius. He had a couple of hits on the radio before he took his own pathetic life. I don't get that we are supposed to hold him up as some great guy...he wasn't. He cheated his daughter out of a life with her father...that is not a good person.

Erika Echo Stearns said...

Now my mother is nutty. Love and her have similiar lifes. My friend was Love's babysitter. Love comes from a hippy enviroment and drug abuse. Does'nt she realize she is doing what her estranged father did. Give no boundries during Frances growth. Hope Frances has lots of locks. And a mother is there for you not the media.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
richard thomm said...

Beautiful old house.

nursedeb said...

frances has tweeted several pics of the house. the tile is just the same!