Marilyn Monroe’s Last Home Saved From Demolition, Designated Los Angeles Cultural Landmark

Marilyn Monroe’s last home will not be demolished by the owners who sought to demolish it after the Los Angeles City Council voted Wednesday to designate it as a historic cultural monument.

Last July, real estate heiress Brinah Milstein and her husband, television producer Roy Bank, purchased the Spanish hacienda-style residence at 12305 West 5th Helena Drive in Brentwood for $8.35 million. The couple, who owned the neighboring property, obtained a permit from the city to demolish the Monroe house, which was initially granted but later revoked.

The couple sued the city of Los Angeles in May so they could complete the teardown.

Monroe was found dead of a drug overdose at the home in 1962. It was the first and only residence she independently owned, according to the New York Times.

At Wednesday’s meeting, Councilwoman Traci Park — who represents Los Angeles’ 11th District, where the property is located — said allowing the house to be destroyed would be “a devastating blow to historic preservation.”

“We have the opportunity to do something today that should have been done 60 years ago,” Park said. “There is no other person or place in the city of Los Angeles as iconic as Marilyn Monroe and her Brentwood home.”

The council was previously scheduled to take up the issue on June 12, but the vote was delayed. Park requested that the decision be postponed so that ongoing discussions with Milstein and Bank could continue.

THE lawsuit filed by the couple on May 6, they asked the court for an order to block the monument’s designation, alleging they would suffer irreparable harm if they could not demolish the house.

In court filings, Milstein and Bank accused the city of “unlawful and unconstitutional conduct,” describing the Brentwood home as “the home where Marilyn Monroe lived occasionally for a mere six months before tragically committing suicide there 61 years ago.”

On June 6, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge James Chalfant sided with the city in a tentative ruling. In it, he said Milstein and Bank made “a poorly disguised motion to win so they could demolish the house and eliminate the issue of historic cultural monuments.” Chalfant said the owners would not suffer irreparable harm since the council would look into the matter.

Conservationists and their supporters have called the residence a beloved piece of Hollywood history. Los Angeles Conservancy, a nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting historic landmarks, called on concerned citizens to attend Wednesday’s council meeting to advocate for its designation as an official historic cultural landmark in Los Angeles.

The group said Monroe’s final house was identified as potentially historic by the city’s SurveyLA program in 2013, but was “currently unprotected.”

“Hollywood’s iconic ‘blonde bombshell’ Marilyn Monroe left us far too soon, and now the home where she lived – and died in 1962 – could also be lost if we don’t act quickly,” the Los Angeles Conservancy said in a description of the home.

Prior to the council’s vote Wednesday, the residence was in the process of being designated as a landmark, with approval from the Cultural Heritage Commission and the City Council’s Planning and Land Use Committee.

Milstein and Bank’s earlier lawsuit claimed the house was not eligible for such a designation.

“All of these behind-the-scenes machinations were intended to preserve a house that in no way meets the criteria of a ‘Historic Cultural Monument,'” the court filing states. “This is reinforced by the fact, among other things, that for 60 years , through 14 owners and numerous renovations and building permits issued by the city, the city has taken no action regarding the now presumed “historic” or “cultural” status of the house.”

Just months before her death, Monroe told a Life magazine reporter that she liked the privacy of the house, refusing to allow the magazine’s photographer to take photos, according to Vanity Fair.

“I don’t want everyone to see exactly where I live, what my couch or fireplace looks like. Do you know the book Each man? Well I just want to stay in the fantasy of Each man,” she told the magazine.