This article originally appeared in the May 2011 issue of Architectural Digest.
The façade of eric kranzler's home in the Trousdale section of Beverly Hills appears much the same today as it did in 1957. Curved stone walls with a warm, reddish cast intersect the crisp white planes of the roof and entrance canopy. A set of bright red-lacquer doors punctuates the modernist composition. Even the crescent-shaped mounds of manicured boxwood that echo the arc of the driveway look, at first glance, as if they could be an original landscape feature.
Altogether, it's a perfect snapshot of la dolce vita as developer Paul Trousdale envisioned the concept in 1954, when he acquired a parcel of hillside land from the Doheny family. His idea was to create a luxury residential community inspired by the promise of plenitude in postwar America, and within a decade everyone from Frank Sinatra to Groucho Marx to Barbara Stanwyck had settled in. “I grew up in Los Angeles and always loved this neighborhood,” says Kranzler, a founding partner of Management 360, whose clients include Tobey Maguire, Kirsten Dunst, Jimmy Fallon, and Christina Applegate. “When I was a kid I'd make my father drive me to the top of Hillcrest to look at Danny Thomas's house.”
Kranzler bought his own home here in 2006. “It had basically not been touched,” he recalls. “I loved the authentic Rat Packy, Palm Springs vibe. The flow, the light, the energy—everything was perfect.” All it needed was a sympathetic renovation that would move the structure into the 21st century without sacrificing its essential '50s character.
At the top of Kranzler's list of potential collaborators was designer Brad Dunning, whose high-profile clients include Tom Ford, Sofia Coppola, and Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher. Although the two had not worked together previously, Dunning was instantly taken with the quality and presence of Kranzler's house. “This is a very stylish, theatrical neighborhood, and Eric and I were in complete agreement on the approach to the project,” Dunning says. “We both wanted to maintain the Trousdaleness of the property.”
To that end, they left the footprint intact but transformed the interiors with upgraded materials, finishes, and architectural details. The original terrazzo floor in the entry hall and dining room was matched and expanded into the living room, kitchen, and bathrooms. Sliding glass terrace doors were added to the bedrooms and den to reinforce the connection between indoor and outdoor spaces. The internal courtyard, formerly a charmless concrete slab, was reimagined as a modernist oasis with tall bamboo and a gurgling fountain.
Dunning's interiors eschew clutter in favor of a few strong, sculptural gestures, such as the living room's voluptuous Vladimir Kagan sofa and curvilinear walnut wall. Vestiges of another era—notably a foot-controlled service buzzer embedded in the dining room floor—were consciously preserved to honor the house's history.
Outside, landscape designer Art Luna created a series of “rooms,” each with its own distinct plantings and personality. He deployed fragrant jasmine and gardenia in the back and side gardens, jade plants and other succulents by the pool, and allées of boxwood off the kitchen. “We wanted to make the landscape slightly more contemporary than a typical '50s garden without getting too tricky,” Luna explains.
After all the architectural and decorative emendations, the house remains a vision of modernist purity such as Julius Shulman might have photographed—open, airy spaces, broad expanses of glass and book-matched wood, sleek terrazzo floors, and lush hillside views of bamboo and agave. The sound of clinking martini glasses seems to linger in the air, as if a soigné cocktail party is forever under way.
Indeed, Kranzler insists that his glamorous, convivial home appears at its best when it is filled with friends, family, and guests. And yet, for someone who has spent his professional life in the company of celebrities, he is capable of being genuinely starstruck when they turn up at his parties: “I cohosted a dinner with Tobey Maguire for [Los Angeles County Museum of Art director] Michael Govan, and Diane Keaton came. She actually asked me to take her on a tour of my house. Diane Keaton!” Kranzler's disarming incredulity, so rare in a town as jaded and cutthroat as Hollywood, emerges whenever he talks about the house and life he has created for himself in the lush enclave of Trousdale—a neighborhood he always aspired to live in.
“When I walk around I think, How is this all mine?” he says. “I feel like the luckiest kid in the world.”