Fred Hollingsworth’s Mahogany House is a hidden jewel of mid-century modernism

Revealed to the public for the very first time since it was completed in 1952, this is the Mahogany House, a richly detailed piece of mid-century residential design by the architect Fred Thornton Hollingsworth. The British-Canadian designer (1917-2015) moved to Canada as a child, only qualifying as an architect in 1959 after an early career as an ad-hoc architectural designer in and around Vancouver.

The Mahogany House shows some of Hollingsworth’s early fascination with the work of Frank Lloyd Wright (he met the legendary architect at his Taliesin West studio). The house is located in Sunset Gardens, a neighbourhood of nearly 50 houses in North Vancouver’s Canyon Heights district.

Sunset Gardens was planned by Hollingsworth, who brought a wealth of influences from West Coast modernism and European residential to bear on his ‘Neoteric’ style, which was better suited to the Vancouver climate and warmer in material palette. This four-bedroom house is almost entirely original, having been in the same family since 1970.

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The garden room, Mahogany House

The second sitting room, Mahogany House

One of the house's four bedrooms

The house was originally commissioned by the owner of nearby millwork business, Frank Paxton. Paxton specified external cladding in mahogany boat plywood, with a similar plywood veneer throughout the interior spaces. The result is a warm jewel of a structure, with precise cabinetry and carpentry paired with solid painted concrete blocks, large panes of glass and high-level windows.

Arranged over one level, the house is a modest 1,990 square feet and contains four bedrooms, two bathrooms and two separate living rooms. The private garden originally included a mature cedar tree that the dining room was built around, while even the front door is discretely positioned out of sight of the street.

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Interior details of the Mahogany House

The kitchen in the Mahogany House

The study

One of the house's four bedrooms

These are the first images of the house taken since it was finished and will surely entice a new owner to take on this impressive structure. The current owner recalls their first visit in 1986. ‘I was eight years old the first time I entered [what was then] my uncle's home, she says, ‘I remember thinking the house was huge. I was impressed by the wall of windows at the back, the two living rooms, and all the trees — a very different kind of home for an eight-year-old who grew up in the city.’

Mahogany House, 4065 Sunset Blvd, Canyon Heights, North Vancouver (Fred Hollingsworth, 1952), CA $2,599,000. WestCoastModern.ca, @WestCoastModern