The residence was constructed by Mr. E.C. Japs, a partner in the Ocean Park office of Japs-Kill Realty. The contractor was listed as the Jones Brothers. According to phone book records, in 1915 the house was sold to Firth and Tudor Crossland, who lived there until the mid 1960s.

Mostly rectangular in plan, the E.C. Japs/Crossland residence is capped by a series of low-pitched gables with deep overhanging eaves. Stylistically, there is an emphasis on horizontality, expressed by low-pitched gables, deep eaves, curved braces, extended lintels, horizontal window arrangements, and battered front porch piers. The primary elevation and second floor rear elevation windows consist of Craftsman-style wood frame sash or casement windows often paired or grouped in trios. Windows on the remaining secondary elevations are a mixture of original wood-frame sash and casements, and non-original aluminum sliders. Roof elements include extended bargeboards and rafter tails with notched ends, exposed carved beam-ends, curved knee braces, and vertical wood slat vents in the gable peaks. Most first floor exterior surfaces are covered with wood shingles while shiplap siding was used on second story elevations. Within the small, recessed front entry area is a characteristic Craftsman door of unpainted oak, broadly proportioned, with a trio of narrow vertical beveled lights.

At the rear, northeast corner of the property out of the public eye is a one-story cottage with a low-pitched gabled roof, board and batten siding, and wood framed and aluminum slider windows. As well, there is a storage building and guest cottage, both located southeast of the main house. The shingle-sided storage building is adorned with a stained glass window; it was moved from the main house when a door to a new bedroom was installed in place of the window. A matching window is still located on wall to the left of the fireplace. Local historians note that the cottage may have been two smaller bungalows that were later combined.

The lot size is approximately 100 feet by 160 feet, and sits on the hilly east side of Beverly Avenue. Today, the building fronts west and is located in a mixed single-family and multi-family residential neighborhood one block north of Ocean Park Boulevard. According to the 1918 Sanborn map, Beverly Avenue was dominated by the Ocean Park Water Company’s reservoir, which was situated immediately north of the subject property on the adjacent parcel. Only seven single-family residences existed on the block in 1918 and all were Craftsman style.

Following the Second World War, at least four large, multi-story apartment buildings occupying multiple lots were constructed on Beverly Avenue. The emergence of large, multi-family apartment buildings located in previously single family streets was a common postwar evolution of neighborhoods throughout the city.