My house was built in 1931, has lathe and plaster walls, custom hand-crafted concrete details, seamless wood paneling, stained and colored glass windows and doors, soaring wood beam ceilings, turrets, gothic windows and doors, round rooms. Many cool features. Unfortunately, it suffered a large loss fire and has to be brought to its studs.

When we rebuild, we intend to keep it as close as humanly possible to its glorious old 1931 self. I am not interested in cutting corners, or dealing with less than qualified artisans and tradespeople. We have no intention of doing the work ourselves. We intend to use a good general contractor and do everything "by the book."

For those of you who have been through this, do you think $400/sq ft is too conservative? What would be a reasonably comfortable cost per square foot to insure we don't run into limitations?

The home is located in the Hollywood Hills.

Far more likely it is low.

WAY low.

You cannot even get your hands on many of the materials (like old growth wood) without hitting the salvage places, and they want a LOT.