Hollywood Land Changes Hands for the First Time in a Century

Aline Barnsdall was an eccentric oil heiress who loved architecture, theater, and her 22 cocker spaniels which ran wild around the grounds of her home, which we know today as Barnsdall Park and the Hollyhock House . In 1917 Barnsdall commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright to come to Los Angeles and build a grand home for her high on a hill overlooking Hollywood. She had big plans to turn her 36 acres near Hollywood and Vermont into a mecca for artists of all stripes, hosting salons in the gardens and dreaming of building a theater nearby.

Conflicts with the architect ended the project before it was complete and by December of 1923 she announced that she would donate the property to the city of Los Angeles for use as a park. Newspapers called it a “Christmas gift,” but the deal came with some reportedly strange conditions: No palms or geraniums could be planted, no war monuments could be built, and a fire had to be kept burning in the fireplace from October through April. The book Silver Lake Bohemia notes that the FBI labeled Barnsdall part of the city’s “lunatic fringe.”

Lawmakers struggled back and forth for years to make the deal work, and by the time of her death in 1946 an art park (that today measures 11.5 acres - of the original 36) was open in and around her old house. Four years after her death, and a gift of $5000 for those Spaniels, Barnsdall’s daughter made a deal to develop apartments to the west, a massive hospital complex to the south, and a shopping center designed by Stiles O. Clements on the east side of the property.

That center, called Barnsdall Square, changed hands recently in a deal reported by Commercial Observer at more than $20 million. “We acquired it in portions from three different owners over the past year, Brad Nourafshan who led the acquisition effort for Reliable Properties , tells Los Angeles . “We assembled all the properties.” Reliable is mostly known for what they describe as “lower demographic” shopping centers in L.A. and the Inland Empire. They were the largest landlord of the 99 Cents Only Stores until their recent dissolution. “We have thousands of tenants ranging from high end national tenants to mom and pop stores,” Nourafshan said. “We’ve had long lasting relationships with Rite Aid, 99 Cents Only, and all the Hispanic grocers. That’s something we were doing before it was cool.”

In addition to shopping centers, the company owns the building that was once Flippers Roller Boogie Palace disco (and is now a CVS Pharmacy) at Santa Monica and La Cienega as well as the AC Marriott Hotel in Beverly Hills.

Nourafshan led the effort to acquire the land from three different sellers, including the octogenarian Barnsdall heirs, whose family had owned the land for more than a century. “They didn’t all have the same goals or same opinions,” Nourafshan says. “It was a one-by-one kind of thing.” The real estate company says they plan to clean up the site and improve security but their plans for the long-term “are unknown.”