Famous American villas for sale

Heritage conservation in the United States is facing a new phenomenon. This is the preservation of private residences that are about 40-50 years old and have become icons of modern architecture. This issue has been highlighted by the American magazine Architectural Record. Recently, there have been reports about the threats to masterpieces by F. L. Wright. Currently, attention is focused on family homes designed by Louis Kahn, Robert Venturi, and Peter Eisenman.
     The iconic Eisenman House VI, built in 1964 on a 6-acre wooded lot in Cornwall, Connecticut, is being offered by its builders, Suzanne and Dick Frank, for $1,350,000 through the auction house Sotheby's. Paradoxically, the land itself may be more lucrative than the deconstructivist icon standing on it. Several celebrities own their residences in the neighborhood of the Frank house. There is a real risk that the new owner of Eisenman’s house, which contains only one bedroom, will demolish it and build a larger villa. Eisenman’s reaction to the possible demolition of his iconic work may surprise some: “It’s their house; they can do with it as they wish. I think the potential destruction of the house bothers them more than it bothers me.”
     Another endangered house is luckier, as it is listed on the Historic Committee's landmarks list in the city of Philadelphia. This is the famous Esherick House by Louis Kahn, completed in 1961 in the Chestnut Hill neighborhood. Being listed protects its exterior appearance, but does not apply to the interior. The current owner, real estate agent Patrick Gallagher, had to reduce the price from the originally requested $2,400,000 to $1,100,000. The house has still not sold even after five years since Gallagher’s father and stepmother first offered it for sale. The price of a similarly sized house in the area is around $600,000. Gallagher believes a buyer will emerge who appreciates Kahn's architecture and will keep the interior in its original form.
     Just 200 meters away stands a house designed by Robert Venturi for his mother. The current owner, Agatha Hughes, has decided to sell it. The Vanna Venturi House, built between 1962-64, is an icon of postmodern architecture. However, the owner, who is the daughter of Thomas Hughes, a university professor at the University of Pennsylvania who bought the house from Venturi's mother in 1973, does not intend to sell the house without proper landmark protection. She has decided to find an organization that would oversee the house's condition in the future. She has been preparing the sale for three years and is reconstructing the house in direct collaboration with the firm Venturi, Scott Brown and Associates. A crucial element in the reconstruction was the choice of a gray-green shade for the house's facade. Hughes adds: “The house now has the best color it has ever had.”