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Paul Rudolph’s Milam Residence splashes onto the market

Concrete Paradise

Paul Rudolph’s Milam Residence splashes onto the market

Paul Rudolph’s Milam Residence splashes onto the market. (Joseph W. Molitor architectural photographs/Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library at Columbia University, courtesy of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation)

Paul Rudolph’s Milam Residence, located in Ponte Vedra Beach outside of Jacksonville, Florida, has hit the market for $4,445,000, according to the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation. Built from 1959 to 1961 and situated on just over two acres of land, the property boasts 6,800 square feet of living space, a swimming pool, and a guest house separated by a central courtyard. Between the two residences, there are five bedrooms, five bathrooms, and two half-bathrooms. Other amenities include central air-conditioning and an in-ground sprinkler system.

Black and white photo of the interior a house
An interior view of the Milam Residence. (Joseph Molitor/Courtesy Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library, Columbia University)

Perhaps the Milam Residence’s most distinctive feature is its eastern frontage, which faces the Atlantic Ocean. A series of rectangular concrete block extrusions extend outward from the houses’s windows, adding a 3D depth effect to the facade and distinguishing the building from its neighbors. The hard edges of the structure contrast markedly with the softness of the surrounding beach, helping the house stand out as a local landmark.

Interior photo of a modernist bedroom
A bedroom in the Milam house. (Photo by Robert Champion/Courtesy of the Archives of the Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation)
The Milam Residence, a home designed by Paul Rudolph
The Milam House today. (Robert Champion/Courtesy Paul Rudolph Heritage Foundation)

As Rudolph’s only building in northeastern Florida, the home has remained in the hands of the Milam family since attorney Arthur Milam originally commissioned the project in the late 1950s. At the time, Rudolph was still in the incipient stages of a career that would be defined by some of the most renowned concrete and modernist designs in the country, including the Yale School of Architecture’s Paul Rudolph Hall in 1963. In a move that reflects both the architect’s renown and growing interest in the preservation of modernist buildings as unique cultural artifacts, the Milam Residence was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2016. With an eye toward the future of the property, the Milam family is searching for a buyer who understands the home’s architectural significance and recognizes this as an opportunity not just to live by the sea, but to own a piece of history that needs to be properly cared for.


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