Preservation Week Has Gatsby Theme

The Great Gatsby is coming to L.A.--in spirit, that is--as the city that once prided itself on its tear-downs will mark National Historic Preservation Week, starting today.

How times change! The growing interest in restoring buildings in L.A. got its start only 10 years ago, with the beginning of the Los Angeles Conservancy, which relocated a few months ago to the Design Center (where the Central Public Library will be temporarily located) on historic Spring Street.

Mayor Tom Bradley will kick off Preservation Week and “Spring Renaissance,” a campaign to revitalize the street, Monday at 11 a.m. with the Gatsby-themed celebration, complete with antique cars and free food, at the Los Angeles Theatre Center, 514 S. Spring St.

Then, next Saturday, Pasadena Heritage (itself only 11 years old) will join the celebration with a tour of four Pasadena buildings designed by Wallace Neff, late architect to the stars and other notables. Tickets at $18 each and maps are available from Pasadena Heritage, 80 W. Dayton St., Pasadena (818/793-0617).

On the tour will be a house built in 1928 for Charles Thorne of the Montgomery Ward family, a house built in 1929 for the son of one of Caltech’s founders, a building that housed Neff’s studios during the height of his career and a home designed in 1924 to resemble Michelangelo’s Florentine Villa Collazzi. “Wallace Neff: Architect of California’s Golden Age” will be available for sale during the tour and may be autographed then by Alson Clark, author, and Neff’s son Wallace, editor.

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This could be the most expensive house in the world: It’s a London mansion listed with Mike Silverman & Associates, Beverly Hills, for about $58 million. And it’s on leased land!

Talk about old . . . the house was built in 1818.

It was recently refurbished (thank heavens!) and has 10 bedroom suites, half a dozen children’s bedrooms, a sauna, spas and exercise rooms.

The 26,000-square-foot mansion sits on 4.5 acres of the 470-acre Regent’s Park. On the private grounds are a swimming pool, tennis court and private lake with a sanctuary for herons.

Current owners are a London family that Silverman described as having “an Iranian background with an office in Kuwait and vast interests in real estate, including hundreds of acres for development in the Las Vegas area. They also speculate in houses, and bought this one with the idea of the father, or patriarch of the family, living in it, but his plans changed, and they decided to sell.”

The family thought there might be some American interest in buying the mansion and at such a price, the best place to market it would be--of course!--Beverly Hills.

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This is the week for real estate-related parties!

First “An Afternoon With Eve.” Then “A Night Under the Stars.”

The Eve event, Tuesday at 1 p.m., will be at the Dennis Estate in Beverly Hills, a new home designed by Gus Duffy and sold to the Dennis family by Jana Jones of Alvarez, Hyland & Young.

Jones arranged for the house to be used by the Mannequins of the Assistance League of Southern California for their “Eve” awards (honoring philanthropic women) and fashion show. This year, the show will feature gowns from designer Nolan Miller’s Dynasty collection, modeled by actress Emma Samms from the cast of TV’s “Dynasty.”

“A Night Under the Stars” will have singer Dennis Day as honorary chairman Saturday. It will be sponsored by the Glen Ivy Financial Group, a Corona-based firm specializing in the sale/marketing/operations of resort time-shares.

The dinner-dance, at $250 a plate, will benefit the Muscular Dystrophy Assn. and the recently established Jerry Lewis ALS Research Center at the Hospital of the Good Samaritan in L.A. (Dennis Day has ALS, better known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease.)

Other celebrity attendees expected are Jerry Lewis, Burt Reynolds, Linda Evans, Jacqueline Bisset, Dudley Moore, Robert Stack, Charlton Heston, Jack Lemmon, Lloyd Bridges, Gregory Peck and Quincy Jones.

Besides sponsoring the evening, Glen Ivy Resorts has donated a door prize of a fully deeded, time-share at Pono Kai Resort in Kauai.

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Realtor Jon Douglas arrived back in Beverly Hills from Tokyo just in time to hear the news last Wednesday that some as-yet-unnamed Japanese investors have agreed to buy the Riviera Country Club for $108 million.

“It surprises me, but then again, it doesn’t surprise me,” Douglas, a longtime member and tennis player, said. “From what I heard over there, they are very interested in resort- or entertainment-type situations. Japanese banks are not that interested in financing large office buildings anymore. They like land, and they like residential property--single-family homes and condos. I think we’ll see some (more) big purchases here this year.”

The rising value of the yen has added fuel to the desires of wealthy Japanese to acquire properties now where they can live and play, he explained. And when they play, the Japanese especially like golf.

“One Japanese businessman told me that he belongs to a golf club in Tokyo where the entrance fee is $3 million, which must be put up front, and if you aren’t approved as a member by the club’s board, you forfeit it,” Douglas said. “I can see why the Riviera is appealing to them, because the clubhouse I saw in Tokyo was raunchy, and the land was not very appealing.”

The Riviera wasn’t even on the market, said Jack Barthell, a managing partner with the Los Angeles consulting firm of Kenneth Leventhal & Co. Although Douglas said the sales price sounded to him like a good buy, not too high, Barthell said, “I think it was an offer they couldn’t refuse.” He described golf as “a difficult business because it is impacted by the seasons” but stressed that it does well financially in Southern California.

The Japanese apparently realized that months ago when they started buying golf courses in Palm Springs, Rialto and Valencia. Last fall, they also purchased the La Costa Resort Hotel & Spa--which has two 18-hole courses.

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Planning a trip to Europe this summer? If so, you might be interested in renting a 16th-Century chateau in the south of France for the month of August. Price? Only $100,000.

Mon dieu ? But think what that includes: 12 bedrooms and an 8-bed children’s dormitory; a fully equipped gym, 2 dining rooms, 5 living rooms, a big-screen TV and room to sit 14 viewers, an office with a telex and a copier, a pool house, swimming pool, tennis court, billiard room and use of 5 horses, 7 bicycles, a jeep, mini-bus and the full-time staff.

The price also includes a ride in a small plane from Paris to the chateau, about 5 miles from Cahors, and all you can drink of the estate’s 1985-vintage wine.

Et maintenant? The deposit is a mere $35,000, says Jacqueline Bell, who is handling the lease through Caverhill & May, Beverly Hills.

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Remember the Granville, the Crescent Heights Boulevard apartment/hotel that was sold recently? Ruth Coine phoned to say that it was called the Voltaire Apartments, not the Chateau Voltaire (as I was told), when it was built in 1930 by her dad, Sam Coine.