The famous ‘Hobbit’ houses have a new owner. He calls himself the ‘newspaper king’

In the years of minimalism and millennial gray construction, a wild and industrial antidote made of old clinker bricks and brown shingles sits on a quiet street on the outskirts of LA and Culver City.

Officially, the property is named after the Lawrence and Martha Joseph apartment complex, named after the Disney artist and his wife who spent three decades building it. But the locals call them hobbit houses – rightly so, because they look straight out of a jrr tolkien novel.

The Complax is conveniently located outside the Culver Culver City Corridor along Venice Boulevard. Surrounded by modern, boxy and infoffensin apartment buildings, they are designed to blend in with today’s taste.

Amidst the darkness of the city, the hobbit houses beg for your attention.

Lampippost drivers, imitating fire. The tree in the front yard shows a face, with eyes and a nose. Homes are full of quirky leaded glass windows, uneven angles and piles of clean wood, like thatched roofs.

This year, property Beat the market for the first time. The offer has been poured in, and sold to perhaps the best buyer out there than Bilbo Baggins himself: An estate agent Michael Libeze.

At $1.88 million, Lilow does not have the highest bid. His main character was and remains one of the best examples of the news style in the region: a witch’s houseA work of art in a natural setting that looks very much like “Hansel and Gretel” to adapt to the streets of Beverly Hills.

The merchant, seeing his connection with the style, encouraged to become a merchant, the trust of the foreign bank. The hobbit houses were his.

Michael Li paid his peers for the hardwood of the hobbit house he bought in early 2025.

“It’s like a perfect piece in my home,” Liboy said. “It’s a little oasis in an overdone city.”

Now that he owns both, he has made himself, tongue-in-cheek, “the king of the newsletter,” saying he aims to protect assets and become a spokesperson for style.

“This is my legacy: to bring a little happiness to as many people as possible,” he said. “It’s about preservation, but it’s also about bringing a sense of wonder and wonder to the world.”

The Hobbit houses are one of California’s best examples of Southern California literary architecture, a style of luxury that first emerged in the 1920s around the golden age of Hollywood. Inspired by the serpieces of the cinema and the centuries-old European landscapes, the Architects designed homes played with turrets and bells on the outside and nooks and crannies inside. When done right, the finished product looks lifted from a fairy tale.

A cat grinds on the roof of a hobbit house in Culver City.

Disney artist Lawrence Joseph created hobbit houses from 1946 to 1970. Over the years, the property grew and grew all yours. He rented the remaining units of Hollywood Tenants such as Actic Nick Nolte and Dancer Gwen Verdon, and this place also lived with the son who introduced SinAtra (the authorities found most of Sinatra.

Lawrence died in 1991, and his wife, Martha, worked in property protection. He acquired extraordinary status in 1996 and granted an easement to Los Angeles ConservancyEnsuring that it cannot be rearranged or dismantled.

The property, which includes nine units in all four buildings, needed some work when he bought it, spent several months of Terants – marine work, trying to interfere with anything protected by La Conservancy Easement.

The Hobbit Houses come with a 15-page Report that describes all the protected objects in the area: Not only the buildings themselves, but also the facade, the landscape features, the natural features and the interior items, including the custom furniture that was called for. Even the wallpaper can’t be touched.

“The protection inside the building is very unusual. I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Libory.

Detail of the floor inside the hobbit house in Culver City.

That means that for renters, most of the furniture is included in the rent. The latest vacant unit – two basements, one bath with a den – includes bar stools and a rocking chair Lawrence carved.

The house is lined with clinker brick, a term in which the clay bricks are placed very close to the flames when they are fired from the Kiln, giving them distorted shapes and colors. Such bricks were sometimes pulled from the beams of old buildings, but these days, they will be built to give a unique look to the buildings, and they are completely natural for the construction of the middle of the earth in Culver City.

Inside, the Lawrence cruise ship center boasts a nautical-themed interior. A ship’s wheel serves as a chandelier, hanging above the top-of-the-grain boat – floor that leads to a galley-style kitchen with a curvy bar.

“The idea behind the bookcase should be something sweet and white, involving movement rather than rexilinear rooms,” said Libow. “There is a proper angle to every material. Everything is amorphous in form.”

Details inside the hobbt’s house in the town of Culver.

No rods will be available; The doors are opened with hidden latches and levers. The Fold-Dow Desk comes out of the living room. In the master bedroom, the “cat door” opens to provide easy access for felines hanging around the property.

The nine units range from 200 square meters to 1,200 square meters. The vacant unit, which has around 1,000 square meters, hit the market a few months ago for $4,500 per month.

The price is high in the neighborhood – most two-bedroom apartments are in the $3,000 range – but interested tenants are still popping up.

“These are not your typical tenants who need four walls and a sink. We get a lot of people from the creative industry,” Libory said. “You’re renting a lifestyle here.”

Libow said that like his home, which serves as a regular stop for the Hollywood Tour buses, the Hobbit houses are a regular stopping point for people traveling through the neighborhood.

“Construction workers will go out during the day to look for turtles in the lake. It’s a break from reality, even if it’s just for a minute,” she said.

Michael Libow outside one of his hobbit houses in Culver City.

Libook’s property manager spends a lot of time on the grounds, looking for projects or small improvements they are allowed to make under the Conservany. But for Libow, who bought it as a collector’s item as an investment, it’s a labor of love.

“It’s not the most functional style of construction, but it’s the coolest,” he said. “It’s strange, but I’m an irony myself. I connect with the irony.”