California livingOctober 18, 20261 min read

Rising Glen: Richard Frazer’s 1956 House and Its New Desert Garden

Richard Frazer designed Rising Glen in 1956 for Stanley Rubin and Kathleen Hughes. Sold in 2023, still original, it was rebuilt to the studs and given a desert garden.

Rising Glen at golden hour: the white single-storey house beyond its freeform pool, the sun through the hillside trees. — Photography: Matthew Momberger, for Robb Report, 2024.

Rising Glen stayed with one family for nearly seventy years. Cottages & Gardens describes Stanley Rubin, the screenwriter and producer, as “the first-ever winner of an Emmy for television (in 1949),” and records that he “had this home designed by Richard Frazer in 1956,” and lived in it with his wife, the actress Kathleen Hughes. “The couple lived in this home together until Rubin’s passing in 2014.”

When the house was sold in 2023, it was still the original.

The entry: lacquered orange doors in a white wall beside a stacked-stone wall, cactus in planters, a red standing mobile. — The entry at Rising Glen: lacquered orange doors beside a stacked-stone wall, a red standing mobile in the court Photography: Matthew Momberger, for Robb Report, 2024.

A House in the Bird Streets

The house sits in the Bird Streets, a single storey on a hillside lot, built of stone and glass under a low roof. Cottages & Gardens describes a main room “lined with floor-to-ceiling walls of glass,” and notes that “sweeping Los Angeles views can be seen from virtually anywhere in the house.”

Cottages & Gardens notes natural stone work throughout the house, and at the entry it rises as a stacked-stone wall.

To the Studs and Back

The house was taken back to the studs. Terrazzo floors now run throughout, with a new kitchen, a primary suite lined with glass and a new freeform pool and spa. Before the sale, Cottages & Gardens had noted that “The front entrance invites visitors in through a bright orange door.” Today the doors are lacquered orange and set in a white wall beside the stacked stone.

The kitchen: a white island, a wall of wood cabinetry with built-in ovens, cactus in the glazed court, the dining table beyond. — The new kitchen: a white island before a wall of wood cabinetry, the cactus court through the glass Photography: Matthew Momberger, for Robb Report, 2024.

A Desert Garden

Outside, cactus and boulders were set into the lawn around the new freeform pool. At golden hour the sun comes low through the hillside trees and across the water.