{"id":394523,"date":"2025-11-21T11:25:26","date_gmt":"2025-11-21T11:25:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/394523\/"},"modified":"2025-11-21T11:25:26","modified_gmt":"2025-11-21T11:25:26","slug":"l-a-s-famous-hobbit-houses-have-a-new-owner-he-calls-himself-the-king-of-storybook","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/394523\/","title":{"rendered":"L.A.’s famous ‘Hobbit Houses’ have a new owner. He calls himself the ‘King of Storybook’"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In the architectural age of minimalism and millennial gray, a wild and whimsical antidote made of old clinker bricks and jumbled shingles sits on a quiet street at the edge of L.A. and Culver City.<\/p>\n

Formally, the spellbinding property is named the Lawrence and Martha Joseph Residence and Apartments, named after the Disney artist and his wife who obsessively spent three decades building it. But locals call them the Hobbit Houses \u2014 fitting, since they look straight out of a J.R.R. Tolkien novel.<\/p>\n

The complex looks comically out of place amid Culver City\u2019s commercial corridor along Venice Boulevard. It\u2019s surrounded by modern apartment buildings, boxy and inoffensive, built to blend in with today\u2019s taste.<\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

A bathroom in one of the Hobbit houses in Culver City adorned in glass tiles and ornate fixtures.<\/p>\n

Amid that urban blur, the Hobbit Houses beg for your attention.<\/p>\n

An electric lamppost flickers, mimicking fire. The tree in the front yard features a face, with eyes and a nose. The homes are filled with quirky leaded glass windows, uneven angles and heaps of wood shingles, resembling a thatched straw roof.<\/p>\n

This year, the property hit the market<\/a> for the first time. Offers poured in, and it sold to perhaps the most fitting possible buyer outside Bilbo Baggins himself: real estate agent Michael Libow<\/a>.<\/p>\n

At $1.88 million, Libow didn\u2019t have the highest bid. His main qualification was that he owns and lives in one of the finest examples of Storyboook style in the region: the Witch\u2019s House<\/a>, a medieval-looking masterpiece that is more befitting a \u201cHansel and Gretel\u201d adaptation than the streets of Beverly Hills.<\/p>\n

The broker, seeing his connection to the style, promoted Libow to the seller, an out-of-state bank trust. The Hobbit Houses were his.<\/p>\n

\"Michael <\/p>\n

Michael Libow peers through a heavy wooden door of a Hobbit house that he purchased in early 2025.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like a companion piece to my own home,\u201d Libow said. \u201cIt\u2019s a little oasis in a city that\u2019s been overdeveloped.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now that he owns both, Libow has declared himself, tongue-in-cheek, the \u201cKing of Storybook,\u201d and said he intends to protect the property and be a spokesperson for the style.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is my legacy: bringing a little bit of joy to as many people as I can,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s about preservation, but it\u2019s also about bringing a sense of awe and wonder to the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Hobbit Houses are one of Southern California\u2019s finest examples of Storybook architecture, a fantasy style that fittingly emerged in L.A. in the 1920s around the start of Hollywood\u2019s Golden Age. Inspired by cinema setpieces and centuries-old European cottages, architects designed playful homes with turrets and gables on the outside and nooks and crannies on the inside. When done well, the finished product looks lifted from a fairy tale.<\/p>\n

\"A <\/p>\n

A cat digs around on the roof of a Hobbit house in Culver City.<\/p>\n

Disney artist Lawrence Joseph built the Hobbit Houses from 1946 to 1970. Over the years, the property developed a lore all its own. He rented out spare units to Hollywood tenants such as actor Nick Nolte and dancer Gwen Verdon, and the place also housed one of the men who kidnapped Frank Sinatra\u2019s son (authorities found most of the ransom money Sinatra paid, $240,000, in one of the units).<\/p>\n

Lawrence died in 1991, and his wife, Martha, got to work protecting the property. She obtained landmark status in 1996 and donated an easement to the Los Angeles Conservancy<\/a>, ensuring that it can\u2019t be remodeled or torn down.<\/p>\n

The property, which includes nine units across four buildings, needed some work when he bought it, so Libow and his property manager, Ben Stine, have spent the last few months playing a developer\u2019s version of \u201cMinesweeper,\u201d trying to make small improvements for the tenants \u2014 electric work, a tankless water heater \u2014 without disrupting anything protected by the L.A. Conservancy easement.<\/p>\n

The Hobbit Houses came with a 15-page report detailing all the things protected on the property: not just the buildings themselves, but also the facade, landscape features and the interiors, including the custom furniture that Lawrence carved himself. Even the wallpaper can\u2019t be touched.<\/p>\n

\u201cProtections within a structure are very unusual. I\u2019ve never seen anything like it,\u201d Libow said.<\/p>\n

\"Detail <\/p>\n

Detail of the flooring inside a Hobbit house in Culver City.<\/p>\n

That means for renters, much of the furniture is included with the rent. The latest vacant unit \u2014 a two-bed, one-bath with a den \u2014 includes bar stools and a rocking chair that Lawrence carved.<\/p>\n

The house is wrapped in clinker brick, a term for when clay bricks are set too close to the flames when being fired in a kiln, giving them distorted shapes and colors. Such bricks were sometimes trashed in older architectural eras, but these days, they\u2019re prized for the unique look they bring to buildings, and perfectly natural for Middle Earth architecture in Culver City.<\/p>\n

Inside, Lawrence\u2019s sailing background shines through with nautical-themed interiors. A ship\u2019s wheel serves as the chandelier, hanging above vertical-grain boat-plank floors that lead to a galley-style kitchen with a curvy bar.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe idea behind Storybook is to have something fanciful and whimsical, which involves movement rather than rectilinear rooms,\u201d Libow said. \u201cThere\u2019s barely a right angle on the entire property. Everything\u2019s amorphous in shape.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Detail <\/p>\n

Detail inside a Hobbit house in Culver City.<\/p>\n

There are no knobs to be found; doors open with hidden latches and levers. A built-in fold-down desk pops out in the living room. In the master bedroom, a \u201ccat door\u201d slides open to provide easy access for felines that hang around the property.<\/p>\n

The nine units range from 200 square feet to 1,200 square feet. The vacant unit, which spans around 1,000 square feet, hit the market a few months ago for $4,500 per month.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a high price for the neighborhood \u2014 most two-bedroom apartments nearby fall in the $3,000 range \u2014 but interested renters still swarmed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese aren\u2019t your typical tenants that need four walls and a sink. We get a lot of people in the creative industry,\u201d Libow said. \u201cYou\u2019re renting a lifestyle here.\u201d<\/p>\n

Libow said like his own home, which serves as a regular stop for Hollywood tour buses, the Hobbit Houses are a regular resting point for people walking through the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cConstruction workers will walk by on their lunch to look at the turtles in the pond. It\u2019s a break from reality, even if just for a minute,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"Michael <\/p>\n

Michael Libow outside one of his Hobbit houses in Culver City.<\/p>\n

Libow and his property manager spend a lot of time on the grounds, looking for projects or small improvements they\u2019re allowed to make under the conservancy. But for Libow, who bought it as a collector\u2019s item as much as an investment, it\u2019s a labor of love.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not the most functional style of architecture, but it is the coolest,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s weird, but I\u2019m weird myself. I connect with weird.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In the architectural age of minimalism and millennial gray, a wild and whimsical antidote made of old clinker…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":394524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5123],"tags":[9102,1582,276,15842,187276,14107,316,21132,6276,2961,9067,187275,224,5337,27894,10558,187277,187279,187278,5921],"class_list":{"0":"post-394523","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-los-angeles","8":"tag-building","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-california","11":"tag-culver-city","12":"tag-hobbit-houses","13":"tag-hollywood","14":"tag-home","15":"tag-king","16":"tag-l-a","17":"tag-la","18":"tag-lawrence","19":"tag-libow","20":"tag-los-angeles","21":"tag-losangeles","22":"tag-many-people","23":"tag-property","24":"tag-spare-unit","25":"tag-square-foot","26":"tag-storybook","27":"tag-style"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115587444369589260","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=394523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/394523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/394524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=394523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=394523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=394523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}