5 Unique Houses in Venice, California

Sometimes sleepy, vibrantly edgy, and always arty, Venice, California, remains a bastion of architectural freedom, where decades ago Frank Gehry famously plunked down an enormous pair of binoculars and dared his colleagues in architecture to join the fun. Here’s a selection of five unique Venice homes that have piqued our interest over the years. Slideshow

Avid surfer and advertising creative director Eric Grunbaum turned to the Los Angeles–based architect Barbara Bestor to design a surf shack for him near the ocean. For Grunbaum, she created a 2,000-square-foot, three-bedroom, three-bath house that harbors a traditional sensibility with a contemporary heart. From the deck off the master bedroom, Eric Grunbaum looks across his front yard. Barbara Bestor designed the second story to float over the ground “like a cloud.”

Photo by: Ye Rin Mok