In December 2018, Ross Johnston, the homeowner of a Twin Peaks home designed by Richard Neutra, known as the Largent House, made headlines after the city’s Planning Commission unanimously ordered him to rebuild a copy of the modernist masterpiece in order to remedy the illegal razing.
In addition to rebuilding the original structure, Johnston was also ordered to put up a punitive plaque near the sidewalk detailing the home’s history and the verboten deconstruction.
Now Johnson is fighting back, appealing the commission’s verdict.
“The Planning Commission decision is invalid, bizarre, and illegal,” said Andrew Zacks of Zacks, Freedman, and Patterson, PC, the land use attorneys representing Johnson. “The Commission’s order that the owner re-build an exact replica of the original 900 square foot 1935 Neutra —a home that wasn’t even on the site when his family purchased the property in 2017—is absurd given permits previously approved by the S.F. Planning Department for a 3,700 square-foot single family home.”
The homeowner’s legal council goes on to say that 49 Hopkins was not a historic resource given that the home’s architectural integrity—most notably, the lines of the original Neutra home—had been lost after several city-sanctioned renovations over the years.
What’s more, the Planning Department already authorized removal of the majority of the existing structure in 2015, and a 1969 fire rendered the home’s structural integrity as “severely compromised.”
Johnston purchased the house for $1.7 million in January 2018 as a family home that “would enable my family of six to move back to San Francisco.” He says that had been “stuck in limbo for over a year” while trying to renovate the home into a larger space.
A hearing before the city’s Board of Supervisors will be the next step, who will mull over the historical integrity of the Neutra home against the Planning Commission’s severe order.
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