Three historic homes in gated Fremont Place were recently available for sale; one has already quietly sold. It’s unusual to have that much activity in the small gated neighborhood of just 73 homes.
Award winning composer Danny Elfman and his wife actress Bridget Fonda are selling their historic mansion and a second prairie style home immediately behind, which they purchased in 2015. Elfman bought the the first property (photo above)Â in 2000; previously it was the home of March Fong Eu, who was elected Secretary of State of California in 1974, the first Asian American woman ever elected to a state constitutional office in the United States.
The six-bedroom, 8,346-square-foot mansion was built in 1920 and features many original details: elaborate carved-stone fireplaces, decorative columned doorways and gilded coffered ceilings, according to the Wall Street Journal, which featured the home in its Mansion Section published last weekend. (Article may require a subscription to view.)
Accoreding to the WSJ, “The piece de resistance: a large ballroom with dramatic vaulted ceilings. The room was designed by an early owner of the house, the real-estate developer Willits J. Hole, in the late 1920s as a gallery for his collection of Old Masters, according to a historical report on the house commissioned by Mr. Elfman.”
Elfman and Fonda are also selling a residence they purchased in 2015. The home is located right behind their residence and was built in the 1922, according to property records, though it was extensively remodeled in the 1960s. The listing price is $5.8 million.
Finally, Variety reported that producer Jason Blum has quietly sold 100 Fremont Place, which he purchased in 2018. The new owners paid $11.4 million, according to Variety, in an off-market transaction. The home was the long time residence of socialite and former news woman Patte Barham Boyne, who passed away in 2016.
Though the Blum family never moved into Fremont Place, they worked collaboratively with the Fremont Place Association’s Design Review Committee to gain approval for exterior renovations and landscape plans they implemented before they completed the sale.
Thanks to historic preservation guidelines in Fremont Place and historic preservation overlay zones, our neighborhoods are fortunate to still have many of these amazing homes built nearly 100 years ago.
