Live in RM Schindler’s Lovell Beach masterpiece

One of California’s most significant modernist houses is for sale for the first time in its 100-year history. Designed by RM Schindler in 1926, the Lovell Beach House has remained in the same family since its completion and is now listed for $18.8 million.

Standing directly on the sand at Newport Beach, the house was designed for naturopath Dr Philip Lovell and his wife Leah, whose ideas about healthy living informed its architecture. Schindler suspended the residence above the ground on five reinforced-concrete frames, giving the family uninterrupted views of the Pacific.

A double-height living room faces the ocean through an immense wall of glass, with a cantilevered balcony connecting four bedrooms above. Original Schindler-designed furniture remains, including a built-in sofa and shelving that divide the living and dining spaces. Elsewhere, timber floors, exposed beams and a sheltered garden lend the experimental structure a distinctly domestic character.

The property originally had open-air sleeping porches, enclosed by Schindler in 1928 when the coastal fog proved too cold.

Recognised on the National Register of Historic Places since 1974, the house has witnessed a century of family life, from everyday mornings by the ocean to weddings and celebrations.

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