Built around a tree
Athena House is a new five-bedroom, five-and-a-half-bathroom house on Goodland Avenue, just south of Ventura Boulevard in Studio City, on a lot the city flags as hillside. The listing calls it a modern Mediterranean, and the photographs bear that out: white volumes, walls of glass, warm wood and natural stone, with curves where most new builds put corners. The move everyone will remember is the stair, which wraps a living tree beneath a skylight at the center of the plan.
The living and dining rooms run through a kitchen with custom cabinetry, an island and an oversized layout, then open through glass doors to the terraces, the landscaping and a heated pool and spa. Upstairs the primary suite has a spa-style bath and serene views, as the listing puts it; four more bedrooms, each ensuite, share the floor with a dedicated media and theater room.
The record
This is a finished house, not a rendering. The building department's file shows the application submitted on December 8, 2023, the new-build permit issued June 26, 2024 for a two-story house of 87 feet 9 1/2 inches by 48 feet with an attached two-car garage and a residential sprinkler system required, a pool and spa permit that September, and the certificate of occupancy issued May 28, 2026. The lot is one of two carved in January 2024 from the double lot of a 1958 house, and a sister new build went up next door at 3710 on the same schedule.
The pocket
South of the boulevard is where Studio City keeps its quiet: hillside lots, tree cover, and a short run to Harvard-Westlake and to Erewhon on Ventura. The house sits on about a third of an acre with four parking spaces, two of them in the garage, and solar panels.
