Are any of us really all that surprised that Liberace had a piano-shaped swimming pool in the backyard of this home in Sherman Oaks? If anything, I’m surprised he bought a house in the Valley and not Beverly Hills. This photo was taken in 1954, which was three years before the 405 Freeway was built half a block from his house.
Out of curiosity, I looked up the house and found that the pool is still intact!
It still has the keys, too!
Not surprising that he chose the San Fernando Valley to live in. It was the bedroom community of the motion picture industry and lots of entertainers lived in the Valley. Many had ranches. The hills south of Ventura Blvd., where this house is located was especially popular. Liberace was a customer of my parents Simon’s Sun Valley Dry Cleaners and I sometimes delivered his cleaning to him when his housekeeper couldn’t pick it up. I got to see the pool (when he wasn’t there one day) and it was really unique and impressive as the photo shows.