Weatherwolde Castle

It is not everyday one comes across a mention of a random castle located on a sleepy residential street in Los Angeles.  So when I found out about Weatherwolde Castle in Tujunga thanks to this page on the Dupont Castle website a couple of summers ago, I took immediate note and started researching further.  The mini manor seemed to be shrouded in mystery, boasting quite a storied past.  It was even rumored to be haunted!  Knowing it would make for a fabulous October post, I jotted down its address and raced out to see it shortly thereafter – and then somehow forgot about it.  It was not until this past February, when Nick Carr, of the fabulous Scouting New York and Scouting Los Angeles websites, posted this Instagram photo of another highly unique residence located right down the road from Weatherwolde (which I stalked the same day as the castle) that I was reminded of the place.  So to the top of my Haunted Hollywood To-Blog List it went!

Google “Weatherwolde Castle” and quite a bit of lore and legend will be kicked back.  That is in large part thanks to its former occupants – one set of occupants in particular.  As the Los Angeles Times stated in a 2005 piece on the home, “And then there'”‘”‘s the mystery factor.  None of the castle'”‘”‘s owners has welcomed neighbors inside — not even members of the historical society.  Much of its provenance is fortified by curiosity and rumor.”  The vast majority of that curiosity and rumor was propagated by William and Yvonne Kenward, who lived in the castle from 1974 to 1979.  During their five-year tenure, the duo was interviewed several times and seemed to love furthering the intrigue surrounding the place, claiming that the unusual pad was built by a French count whose wife was either pushed or jumped to her death from a second-story window during a party on the premises.  The two also asserted that the subsequent owners, a Dutch couple, disappeared without a trace shortly after moving in.  The next residents, they alleged, found the castle to be haunted by ghosts with, you guessed it, “thick Dutch accents.”

The home’s actual history is much tamer.  It was originally designed by engineer/architect George J. Fosdyke for a New Orleans bookkeeper named Marcel Dumas in 1928.  At the time of its inception, the 3-story French Normandy-style property boasted 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, 2,535 square feet, a turret with a spiral cantilevered cement staircase, a stone fireplace with a chimney featuring a fleur-de-lis sculpting, a main hall, Gothic arches, a one-acre plot of land, landscaped gardens, and a crypt.  Marcel dubbed the dwelling “Chateau de Sales.”  Unfortunately, aside from the fleur-de-lis detailing, virtually none of it is currently visible from the street.

Dumas (I swear I can’t read that name without thinking of this!) lost the home due to unpaid taxes in 1940, upon which it was snatched up by Jack Harris and his wife, Dixie Ann (though Jack falsely told anyone who would listen that he won the castle in a lucky game of poker).  Dixie Ann worked as a secretary to Selznick International Pictures head David O. Selznick.  As such, many Hollywood luminaries spent time at Chateau de Sales, including Boris Karloff, Orson Welles, Bela Lugosi, and Robert Mitchum.  The Harris family lived on the premises until 1974, when they sold to the Kenwards.  It was William and Yvonne who gave the pad the name Weatherwolde Castle, meaning “snug within from the weather.”  Though the duo sat for numerous interviews during their years of ownership, they remained rather secretive about their home.  A 1977 Los Angeles Times article (from which the photo below showing a rear view of the property comes from) stated, “The Kenwards have an unlisted telephone number and give interviews only on condition that the location of their castle will not be disclosed.”  Lucky for them IAMNOTASTALKER was not around in those years.

In 1979, the Kenwards sold Weatherwolde to Hollywood producers/writers Michael Baser and Barbara Stoll.  The couple made several modernizations in the years that followed, including covering the original concrete flooring with hardwood and adding lots of white cabinetry and shelving.  Baser and Stoll put the pad on the market in 2005 and it wound up being purchased by developer Scott Anderson who found the three plots of land the structure stood on more attractive than the castle itself.  He made plans to raze it and build three new homes in its place.  The first part of the demolition process involved excavating the trees and foliage dotting the property, as well as demoing the rear patio, the front wall, and the stone crypt.  Doing so caused Weatherwolde’s façade to become visible to passersby for the first time in decades.  That’s it post-excavation below.  You can check out some additional photos of the place from around the same time here and here.

Google Street View circa June 2008 also provides some good imagery of the castle post-excavation, as you can see below.  Neighbors who had long since forgotten about the estate began to take note – and action.  They did not want such a unique home demolished.  Bulldozers wound up being stopped at the very last minute thanks to the efforts of concert promoter/area resident Gina Zamparelli, who was contacted by the Crescenta Valley Heritage group at midnight the night before the razing was to take place.  Gina quickly penned a press release and sent it out to her many media contacts.  Her cries were heard loud and clear.  By 6 the next morning protesters were out in full force.  When the demo crew arrived on the scene, they took one look at the ruckus and left.  A judge stepped in and put an official stop to the entire construction project shortly thereafter.

In a tragic twist, at around the same time, locals, who figured the pad was going to eventually be razed, started looting, removing anything and everything from the premises including stained glass windows, doors, hinges, light switches, handles, and appliances.  The castle’s iron staircase railing was even pinched via a neighbor wielding a sledgehammer.  Within a matter of days, Weatherwolde went from being fully functional and in fabulous shape with gorgeous greenery and landscaping to completely barren, its interior utterly destroyed thanks to both the excavation and the pillaging.  Amazingly, one local preservationist, a musician named William Malouf, was still interested in purchasing and restoring the once grand home.  After quite a bit of negotiating, Anderson finally agreed to sell Weatherwolde and two of its plots of land to him in October 2005 for $650,000.  The developer held onto the third plot, situated just north of the castle, and constructed the rather unattractive 4-bedroom, 3-bath, 2,352-square-foot house pictured below, which he sold for $690,000.

William got to work right away and, miraculously, was able to reclaim virtually all of the items that had been stolen – even the staircase railing.  His efforts to repair the castle, which became Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument #841 in 2006, are a true labor of love.  You can listen to a fabulous 2014 speech he gave about the project and see photos of the restored interior here.  I was surprised to see when I arrived, though, that what is visible from the street remains a bit unkempt and that chain-link fencing still surrounds the place.  Malouf did mention in his speech that the area where Anderson built the new home pictured above was formerly the site of Weatherwolde’s driveway and entrance gates.  When the land was split, extensive work had to be done to add a driveway to the other side of the property.  I am guessing – and hoping – that at some point a new gate will be installed to replace the chain-link fence, as well.

Per aerial views, the backyard still seems to be a work in progress, too.  I can only imagine how fabulous the place is going to be when the entire restoration is complete – not to mention how perfect it will be for trick-or-treating each October!  Here’s hoping Malouf is into Halloween!

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Until next time, Happy Stalking!

Stalk It: Weatherwolde Castle is located at 10633 Commerce Avenue in Tujunga.

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