Great Streets: 7th Street (Sand)

Seventh Street in the South End is one of those fabled Manhattan Beach walkstreets. As much or more than others, this one is a kid's paradise.

7th is a flat stretch that goes all the way from Crest to Valley – no break at Ingleside. On a recent stroll we counted no fewer than 3 playhouses, 4 basketball hoops (of varying sizes) and a tetherball post in the walkstreet. It's a playground.

7th boasts a number of beach cottages that are well-kept and have preserved their original charm. Many of the entrances are warm and welcoming, embracing the walkstreet. (We cringe when we see walkstreet homes that are tucked behind fences or don't have a patio or deck fronting the public areas – why bother being on a walkstreet?)

On 7th, you'll also see a handful of new homes that are designed to take the utmost advantage of the location.

One home in particular is notable for how most of a whole wall on the ground floor opens out onto the front yard, which continues out onto the walkstreet without interruption.

The flat south end walkstreets are super kid-friendly, but as we've heard from current and former residents, they're not for everyone.

Some say that once their kids have grown older they'd rather live in a more mellow location. We don't take this as anti-kid so much as pro-peace-and-quiet.

The adults get their share of fun, too, though – the extraordinary, raucous Halloween activities on these South End blocks are a major draw, with plenty of parties for grown-ups alongside the trick-or-treating.

For its charm, family appeal, and easy access to the beach and downtown, 7th Street is one of MB's Great Streets.

Great Streets: The Strand, Part I

The Strand is a 2-mile-long playground. It's hardly a street, since there are no cars – just walkers, joggers, baby strollers and dogs. And the occasional party spillover, toddler meanderings and games of dominoes.

Still, The Strand is a Great Street, and a distinguishing feature of MB. It's both very public and very exclusive. Anyone can visit, but only the elite few can buy in.

It's a bit funny now to imagine that when Manhattan Beach was first founded, living on The Strand could be a hassle. The big problem: Blowing sand. It would bury yards, patios and the wooden boardwalk, piling up on windowsills and rooftops. And there were the beachfront train tracks (where the bike path is now) plus electrical poles ruining the sight lines.

Our ancestors gradually got a grip on these problems, moving the dunes around, ditching the train tracks and paving the wooden boardwalk. That work helped make beachfront living on our white-sand beach the multi-million-dollar ticket that it is today.

For this first story, we're looking at some homes on the southern half of The Strand (south of 20th). We're offering snapshots of some of our favorites in the area. Note that these are smallish thumbnails, but clicking any pic will enlarge it.

Our first photo above is of one of the oldest homes on The Strand, circa 1902, according to one history. (Jan Dennis' Manhattan Beach, California, via the MB Historical Society.) It's been remodeled a few times, but always in keeping with a classic beach-cottage feel. Located at 8th/The Strand.

Further south (at 4th), the natural-wood look and classic styling of this home combine wonderfully with naturalistic landscaping. This may be the most unpretentious and beautiful of Strand homes. (And please, don't the rest of you go slipping notes under the door asking to buy it, whenever they're willing – we're sure ours is first in line already. Right?)

Marking a transition is our third pic, a newer home that somehow draws together a beach-cottage feel with its wood shingles, a modernist feel with concrete and sharp angles and a boating feel with porthole windows and the overall design. It's impossible that this design works as well as it does.

There are several sharp, crisp contemporaries along The Strand, particularly in the southern half. One concrete-and-glass modern home at 1212 The Strand (4br/5ba, 4600 sq. ft.) sold for $10.7m last year, reportedly the highest price ever paid on The Strand.

A slightly larger home on a corner lot further south at 120 The Strand (pictured) was offered at around $10m in 2005, and eventually sold for $8.8m in January 2006.

Our final pic (below) is of the northernmost home of this set, at 19th St. We can't name the style, per se, but we love it. It's simple, crisp, modern and great.

Researching this one, we believe we learned something new.

The nondescript building to the immediate south of this home appears to have been joined with the main house quite recently. At a price nearing 3-4 times that of the original home on the corner lot.

So there's a goal: First, buy on The Strand and build a wonderful home. Then, if it's just not enough, buy out the neighbor and build an annex. You can't leave The Strand once you've landed there!

Great Streets: 31st St. (Trees)

If you're going to live in the Tree Section, you'll probably want to see some trees. How about a canopy? Then you should be looking at 31st St., one of MB's great streets.

In the stretch of 31st between Laurel and Blanche, and particularly between Agnes and Blanche, the feel of the street is that of somewhere else. Tall trees give 31st an East Coast or even college-town feel. Afternoon sun filters through the leaves to create a bright but calm and shady, sleepy atmosphere. On the few days a year that we have in MB that are truly warm, 31st is a respite.

There's something else that raises 31st above the rest: Street-to-alley lots. Much of MB would be far better, comfier and more human-friendly if it had been laid out like 31st. We're so accustomed to narrow lots that force house faces to be dominated by garages, we almost forget that there's another way to do it. Put the garage in the back, tucked away, and you can have a home that says "people live here," not "cars live here."

Stylistically, the blend of homes on 31st works. There's plenty of nice, new construction in a range of styles, from craftsman to contemporary. Many of the older homes on these blocks are well-kept. Two new homes sold for $3m+ in the 700 block in 2007, including one of MBC's favorites, 712 31st (the sole home pictured here), which commanded $3.325m for 5br/4ba, 3800 sq. ft.

You can stroll 31st fairly comfortably, even though it has no sidewalks, and, as a result, it's one of the more popular walking streets in the area. Residents and neighbors are out frequently. It's one of the better routes west toward Sand Dune park and the beach, which is surprisingly close once you climb the stairs over the dune.

Nothing's perfect, and 31st suffers from the same liability some of the other east-west streets in the area do – they were laid out in a time of cars, but without sufficient thought about where we would all be parking our multiple cars. Part of each home's frontage on 31st must be dedicated to parking. That can make the street seem cluttered. And you can dress up the spot(s) you create all you want, but what will you do when someone parks in "your" spot?

Speaking of cars and garages and such, there's a clear divide between the north and south sides of the street. There's just enough slope here so that most homes on the north side need to put garages at the same level as the home, or above. On the south side, the dreamy side, garages are down on 30th St., and new homes can build livable space over the garages. That was one of the huge advantages of 712 31st, which completely hid the garage while creating a great outdoor space above it, right off the kitchen.

For its trees, layout, walkability and other charms, 31st St. is one of MB's great streets.

Great Streets: Pacific (Hills)

Depending on where you live or drive around town, you might have very different ideas about Pacific Ave.

In the Trees, Pacific can be just plain busy – i.e., not very "pacific." If you're headed north in the morning (or any time), you've got refinery stacks in your sights as you shuffle toward Rosecrans.

But whoa, what a completely different story Pacific Ave. is over in the Hill Section. It's perhaps the city's premier ocean-view street, particularly in the stretch between 6th-10th St. Here, "Pacific" actually means you will see a lot of the Pacific Ocean. Big-blue-marble-type views. (Those power lines are on the way down.)

In short, when you say "Hill Section" and think "ocean view," Pacific ought to be your next thought.

(Please forgive MBC for the moderate quality of our snapshots. John Post hasn't returned calls seeking free services on our behalf. To be honest, these are views that are awfully hard to take in adequately as a single person scanning the horizon; a mere camera is just going to chop the experience down further anyway.)

There's one active listing that takes full advantage of this view: 700 8th, just a couple of doors west of Pacific. The sellers seek $8m there, banking in part on the views.

Another big factor in Pacific's favor: The relative homogeneity of the newer construction. There is a fairly long stretch at the top of the hill in which all the homes share a similar style – call it "Cape Cod" if you will. (Who are these Boston people naming our beach-style homes?) Several were built in the same period of the mid-late 1990s.

Maybe you don't realize how choppy, uneven and disconcerting the newer development in MB really is until you see a row of homes that are stylistically consistent with one another. On Pacific, particularly on the view side, you've got classic beach estates uncluttered by Caliterraneans, Tuscans, Contemporaries and Old Shacks. Did someone actually develop a vision in this area, somehow?

For the views and the vision, Pacific is one of MB's great streets.

Great Streets: 18th St. (Sand)

MB has tons of charms, but one of its true jewels is a seaside walkstreet that's cozy, warm and winding: 18th St., west of Highland. (Click any pic to enlarge.)

No doubt, the midtown walkstreets nearby are all prized for their their ocean views, proximity to downtown and relative isolation.

They're quiet because Manhattan Ave. doesn't run at all between 15th St. and Marine (which would be 22nd), which means few people driving around town might even know what's west of Highland in this area.

18th St. stands out, for MBC, for one principal reason – the walkstreet itself winds and banks in a gentle, serpentine fashion all the way down the hill, with all the odd curvy points landscaped to the individual tastes of residents. It's not quite Lombard St., San Francisco, but it is unique in MB.

The flavor of the neighborhood is the other big factor. The 30 or so homes on the block between Highland and Ocean are easily worth $100 million or more, all told, but there's very little new construction. Many of the homes date from the 1970s, some older, some newer. Most are well kept. You get the sense that residents know a good thing and don't let their homes get out of the family too often.

A couple of shockers on the block: A double lot at the corner with Ocean features a 430-sq.-ft. home built in 1909 (pictured), with original landscaping to boot. (We kid.) Halfway up the block, there's a completely vacant lot that's paved over and used for parking.

You just know there are folks who think either one would make a great place for a $6-8 million home.

There was one sale on 18th last year, at 132 18th. The home was (is) 3br/4ba, 3000 sq. ft., mostly new circa 1993. It went for $3.75m, down almost $250k from start, but still plenty steep. Those sellers were comparative fly-by-nighters, having bought onto the block in 2004 (at $3m).

Thusly we conclude the first of our "Great Streets" series. We first asked readers to nominate streets, or blocks, in this story last month – some great ideas there – and welcome your nominations in the comments here, too.