From Architectural Digest |
"Veteran entertainment executive Ricky Strauss is, to put it bluntly, a design freak. The series of homes he’s designed for himself during his decades-long tenure in Los Angeles attest to both his tenacity as a collector and the elastic scope of his taste. In the past he’s applied his incisive eye to a Tudor Revival house in Hancock Park, a glorious Hollywood Regency in the Hollywood Hills, a Mediterranean Revival (also in Hancock Park), and a classic post-and-beam dwelling perched above the Sunset Strip. Strauss’s latest passion project is a spruce modernist home with an intriguing architectural pedigree, tucked discreetly in a wooded canyon on the city’s west side. “I was attracted to the house’s history and its intimate relationship with the landscape. It was built for a musician, and I was determined to retain that creative spirit,” says Strauss, the former head of global marketing at Walt Disney Studios and most recently president of content and marketing for Disney+.
The 1951 Veneklasen House was originally designed by architect Kenneth Lind. Modernist maestro Pierre Koenig subsequently put his own mark on the structure, with the majority of his work confined to the focal living room. Some years later, Josef Van der Kar—a fascinating but lesser-known modernist architect on the L.A. scene—designed an addition. Before Strauss bought the property, the previous owner commissioned an extensive renovation, including the addition of a second level for a new primary bedroom suite, by Los Angeles–based Chu-Gooding Architects." ~ Architectural Digest
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