Michael Balzary, better known as mononymic Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea, listed a 1930s traditional in the Los Feliz area of Los Angeles, Calif., at $2.997 million. The gap-toothed six-time Grammy winner and occasional actor, who popped up on silver screen in the summer 2017 sleeper hit “Baby Driver,” and his international fashion model wife, Frankie Rayder, acquired the modest-by-rock-star-standards residence not quite four years ago for $2.47 million. The two-story residence, a not-unpleasantly boxy, semi-Colonial dipped in a strong tincture of Streamline Moderne that is shyly set but not entirely invisible behind a towering hedgerow and secured gates on a just over one-quarter of an acre corner parcel just south of the eastern flank of Griffith Park, contains four and potentially five bedrooms and 4.5 bathrooms in 3,561-square-feet of art-filled interiors.
An unusually purple-painted door set into a shallow, paneled porch under a stately broken pediment opens to a central entrance hall and stair gallery that features original magnesite flooring and staircase. The foyer is flanked by ample formal living and dining rooms, the former with a fireplace and both with lustrously refinished hardwood floors, elegant moldings and extraordinary, 30-pane bowed bay windows that fill the rooms with natural light. Arranged around a center island with jet-black granite countertops on antique white cabinetry and designer-quality appliances, the kitchen opens over a short serving counter to a breakfast room that spills out through French doors to a sheltered dining terrace and built-in barbeque.
A partially paneled family room with tile-accented angled fireplace and an en suite guest bedroom or staff suite complete the main floor and upstairs two guest bedrooms that each have a private, vintage-tiled bathroom are joined by a master suite that encompasses an adjoining study/office or potential fifth bedroom plus a private terrace, walk-in closet and updated bathroom with marble-topped double-sink vanity, classic claw-footed soaking tub and separate, over-sized shower decked out with multiple shower heads and built-in bench.
The flagstone-paved dining terrace outside the kitchen and breakfast room steps down to a grassy yard surrounded by mature landscaping. Off to one side there’s a detached two-car garage and wide set of steps leads up to a lap-lane swimming pool and spa.
Balazary and Rayder, who continue to own a two-plus acre bluff-top compound along Malibu’s Encinal Bluffs they scooped up in 2006 for $9.98 million, are certainly no strangers to the property gossip columns. Prior to their coupling, Balzary once owned a secluded Hollywood Hills home later owned by Jake Gyllenhaal and in 2008 the couple paid $3.85 million for a Los Feliz estate they sold in 2010 for just under $6 million to comedian Jack Black. More recently, the Balzary-Rayders owned the so-called Van Griffith Estate, a gated Los Feliz compound that backs up to Griffith Park they picked up in July 2011 for $4.45 million and sold just over three years later for $6 million. As was sussed out by property snitch Yolanda Yakketyyak, the Van Griffith estate was recently hoovered up by property-mad mega-producer Megan Ellison for $7.75 million.
Listing photos: Compass
