Take a tour of the 'Flintstones' house in Hillsborough, California

Table Of Content

• Yabba Dabba Don't: California Town Rejects Flintstones House
• Dream Your Own Abstract Acrylic Floral Paintings
• Inside a real-life $2.8 million 'Flintstones' home in California
• You are unable to access sanfran.com
• Residents in wealthy Montecito are using boulders to block hikers’ parking, bringing warnings

When Hillsborough objected to some of her outdoor decorating choices, it issued stop work orders and ultimately filed the suit. She responded in part by alleging racial discrimination by city employees. As part of the recent settlement, the town agreed to cover Fang’s $125,000 in legal fees and said the dinosaurs, mushrooms and other yard decor could stay. It was designed in 1976 by William Nicholson and most recently purchased by Florence Fang in 2017 for $2.8 million. Large dinosaur statues and other Flintstone-themed artwork cover the front and back yards.

Yabba Dabba Don't: California Town Rejects Flintstones House

Fang’s lawsuit began in March 2019, after the town of Hillsborough deemed the home’s lawn decorations as a “highly visible eyesore” following complaints from neighbors and residents. Town officials alleged that the caveman-themed menagerie of 15-foot dinosaur statues and cartoon sculptures violated building codes and were built without proper permits. Now, issues with the property’s decorative style have landed the house and its owner in court. The property was purchased in 2017 by octogenarian Florence Fang, who made several whimsical additions to the home, including anodized steel dinosaurs and “Flintstones” characters in the yard which are visible to passing motorists on Interstate 280. In 2019, the wealthy, snobbish residents of the town of Hillsborough attempted legal action to have the statues removed. In June 2021, the matter was settled in favor of Ms. Fang; the sculptures were allowed to stay.

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But at least in its current form, officials and some residents do not to want the home, which evokes the 1960s cartoon, in their backyard. A panel of code enforcement officials last fall declared many recent renovations to the home to be a public nuisance, according to a town order, and have asked a judge to do the same. The suit alleges that the homeowner did not secure the proper permits and approvals for the changes. Legendary TV host Dick Clark and his wife are selling their home in Malibu for $3.5 million. Normally, a celebrity selling a piece of real estate in California is nothing to write about, but, in this case, it's nearly impossible not to share images of the media tycoon's Flintstones-inspired house. Based on the classic 60's cartoon, the specially-designed residence features a cave-like atmosphere with high ceilings.

Inside a real-life $2.8 million 'Flintstones' home in California

The town sent three notices from December 2017 through August ordering that Fang stop altering the property, but officials said those requests were ignored. After a hearing over the issue in October, the town’s administrative panel decided that some of the prehistoric metal animals qualified as “unenclosed structures” and required a building permit and other approvals. “The stone family cannot always stay in the stone age,” Fang said, her explanation for the property’s constant evolution. Several years ago, Fang was just searching for a nice, quiet place to retire — someplace where she could downsize a bit from her longtime Hillsborough home. Then she toured the domed abode, designed in the 1970s by William Nicholson, and couldn’t pass up the opportunity to purchase the property she’d grown accustomed to seeing from the car on drives.

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Round built-in shelves line the walls of the kitchen along with fun details like these swirling designs in the ceiling. Inside the tallest orange dome is a sitting area called the conversation pit. An orange upholstered couch curves around the front of the fireplace, and a big window looks out onto a succulent garden and patio. Today, The Flintstone House is as well known for its architecture as it is for its sporadic tenants, which has led to several urban legends surrounding the home’s ownership. It’s also said that several famous Silicon Valley investors have lived there as well.

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Government has the right to enforce public safety codes, and to ensure property owners don't impinge on the rights of other property owners, said Tim Iglesias, a property professor at the University of San Francisco School of Law. Private property has been regulated in the United States since colonial times, he noted. The interior of the house is filled with Stone-Age-like features from floor to ceiling and even furniture and artwork. A pigasaurus as a garbage disposal, a woolly mammoth as a shower, a sprinkler and even a vacuum cleaner and other animal appliances and domestic items are commonly used by Fred and his wife, Wilma. While the eccentrically designed home nestled into a hillside overlooking the Crystal Springs Reservoir has its critics, it also has some fans. Tourists and travelers who spot the property from Highway 280 often stop to take photos and share their wonderment of the house on social media.

It’s been over a year since the so-called Flintstone House at 45 Berryessa Way in Hillsborough went on the market for $4.2 million, and it’s still without a buyer. “The parties have reached an amicable resolution of the case to the satisfaction of all the parties, such that the improvements made to the Flintstone House will be permitted to remain,” the settlement states, according to the Palo Alto Daily Post. Florence Fang, former publisher of the San Francisco Examiner and chairwoman for the Independent Newspaper Group, bought the house for $2.8 million in 2017. Our psychological, our cellular makeup, is that we're a little more comfortable in soft structures than we are in a box.

While The Flintstone House is marveled at by many passersby, it’s also loathed by many Hillsborough residents. In the mid-1980s, the home began to show serious wear as water runoff on the steep hillside caused it to sink and the walls began to develop deep cracks. Word spread of such problems and several neighbors pushed to have the home removed.

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However, to their dismay, a severe renovation and change in ownership brought the home back to life in 1987. It took on its characteristic “Flintstone” look when it was painted completely orange in 2000. The home, which is also referred to as the Dome House, Gumby House, Worm Casting House and, Bubble House, is a three-bedroom, two-bath house with a two-car garage and about 2,700 square feet of living space. The upstairs bedroom, located in the tallest dome, has a spiral staircase inspired by a sugar cone with a diameter that increases to equal that of the floor above. The master bathroom is also unique, with its scattering of large rocks in place of floor tiles.

Fang won’t discuss details of the settlement this spring, but is now free to celebrate the quirkiest piece of real estate in the Bay Area in peace. She’s recently added a hulking Bigfoot statue to the patio and a Gold Rush-themed room, which Fang showed off to the Bay Area News Group this week in a rare tour of the orange, red and purple-domed home on Berryessa Way. Now, she’s planning a giant beanstalk and a phoenix rising from the ashes.

Trouble is brewing at the “Flintstone House,” but this time Fred, Wilma, Pebbles and Dino have nothing to do with it. For a while people called it the “Barbapapa House,” after the blob-like character from a series of French children’s novels. He was kind of like Gumby—and now and then 45 Berryessa was also called the Gumby House.

But her grandson, a recent college graduate, has spent the pandemic hunkered down at his grandmother’s place amid the stuffed tigers, watermelon-shaped pillows and, naturally, Flintstone figurines dotting the home. There was hardly anybody in there at the time, so I laid down on the floor, and I looked up at the (domed) ceiling. Town officials in Hillsborough filed a lawsuit against Fang, calling the house an eyesore that doesn't comply with the community standards. She says her house represents the idea of the American dream with all different kinds of creatures living together in harmony.