Filed under: Estates

You know a listing is posh when it has aerial shots. Today’s estate is located in Governor’s Land, a private residential community located at the confluence of the James and Chickahominy Rivers seven miles from Colonial Williamsburg. The community is designed for low population density with 60% o f the 1,482 total acreage preserved.This new home is surrounded by 10 acres of lawns, woodland paths and is on the banks of the James River. It even comes with its own private island. The home is a 19,000 square foot residence but with just five bedrooms there is room for a whole lot of other add-on rooms like a library, home theater room, or elevator. The home is a modern version of a grand Southern home, complete with a sweeping staircase entrance. Of course older homes don’t have an indoor pool and spa area, an open kitchen or a lavatory in green stone and dark wood that resembles a library. This home is listed at $10.5 million.

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This Sedona, Arizona home isn’t just full of art, it has art in the entrance. The “Dance of Life” bronze leads the way to a stone staircase flanked by six stacked-stone towers. On the other side of the entry is a glass wall that shows off the views and the pool. The home is shaped like a crescent moon and has plenty of windows to showcase the views. There are five bedroom sites, a great room, dining room, gourmet kitchen, office and theater room and a separate two-bedroom caretaker’s apartment and detached gym. The property also includes two horse stalls. The home was done in luxury materials including white Thassos marble flooring (quarried and shipped in tile form from Greece) and Travertine flooring (from Italy) throughout as well as stained glass windows and sconces. The home is wired for sound with a full CD/DVD central audio system with individually controlled loudspeakers in all main areas there is also a home theater with a CD, DVD, VCR system in the media room and three additional televisions including a plasma screen in the living room. The home also includes all statues and sculptures that are displayed outside which includes several resin and bronze artworks. it is listed at $10 million.

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Filed under: Estates, Celebrity Shopping

Last Sunday’s estate took us to Spain and the home of artist Joan Miro, this week we’re looking at the Paris home of another type of artist, fashion designer Kenzo Takada. Takada, who built the fashion line Kenzo and sold it to LVMH in 1993, lives in a striking home located on the Right Bank between the Place de la Bastille and the Place des Vosges. The approximately 14,000-square-foot home is very East-meets-West with much of the design informed by traditional Japanese design with modern touches.

The International Herald Tribune recently ran a piece on the home which states that Kenzo built the home between 1987 and 1993 with the help of an architect friend. The four-level home has five bedroom suites including Kenzo’s master bedroom suite which has two dressing rooms. The main home has a contemporary living room with an indoor lap pool, library, a professional kitchen used for massive parties, a gym, sauna, hammam and two Jacuzzis. The home includes a mezzanine studio where Kenzo worked on his designs and also painted. The home has oak floors, an elevator and six fireplaces. There are also three staff apartments and parking spaces. The outdoor spaces here are delightful with several different levels of gardens. There is a tranquil garden with a fish pond and a cherry tree. There’s also a Japanese-style pavilion that’s furnished with traditional tatami mats and has one room dedicated to the tea ceremony.

This home is more like a private universe than a home built for one man with very precise tastes. I hate to use the word zen here but that is what comes to mind when looking at this astonishing home. Kenzo decided to put the home on the market because it is now too huge for him and he wants to find a more modest pied-

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Filed under: Estates, Celebrity Shopping

From Berg Properties Huge Time Listings:
–via In Touch Weekly, ‘Dancing with the Stars’ co-host Samantha Harris and her husband, Michael Hess have paid $1,600,000 to purchase a in Los Angeles west of the Century City area.
–Slash has finally sold his five-bedroom “lawsuit house” in the Hollywood Hills, possibly to San Diego Padres relief pitcher Randy Wolf.
–An update of the real estate moves of Hilary Swank, she paid $5.8 million earlier this year for a place in Pacific Palisades and told W Magazine that she left New York because of the high real estate prices (Swank and ex-hubby Chad Lowe sold their Manhattan townhouse for $7,050,000 million in January) but likely her romance with her former agent John Campisi, who is L.A.-based also had something to do with it. Nevertheless, New York magazine has spotted Swank browsing for a loft and reported that she was looking at a a two-bedroom unit in the Better Ink development in Manhattan.
–’One Tree Hill’ actors Chad Michael Murray and Sophia Bush have sold their home in Wilmington, N.C. for $730,000.
–Justin Long, who is perhaps most famous for the “I’m a Mac” ads, has paid about $1,400,000 for amid-century modern home in the Hollywood Hills.
–Nicole Richie has sold her condominium unit in the Empire West building in West Hollywood for $2,250,000.

From the Real Estalker:
–via Newsday, Patricia Kennedy Lawford’s estate has sold her Southampton home for $9.8 million.
–via Luxury Real Estate, Eddie Murphy’s ex-wife Nicole Murphy has sold their Sacramento area home for the highest price the Sacramento area has ever seen, $6.1 million.Most of the furnishings, including at least 20 TVs and a sleek, black, $200,000 Schimmel Pegasus grand piano were included in the deal.
–The Real Estalker Mama has nabbed some interior shots of the Golden Beach, Florida home that Ricky Martin has put on the market for $22.5 million.
–The Mama takes a look at Peter Guber’s Kauai Tara Plantation. This home has sat on the market for $46.5 million for almost 3 years, we covered it way back in February 2005.
–Amanda Peet and her screenwriter husband David Benioff have sold their Angelo View Drive home high above Holmby Hills and have purchased the former James Cagney estate above Sunset Boulevard on N. Wetherly Drive.
–50 Cent has reduced the price of his Connecticut home to $12 million from $18.5 million.

From the LA Times Hot Property:
–Nicolas Cage has pulled his Bel-Air mansion, which was listed at $35 million, off the market.
– St. Louis Rams owner Georgia Frontiere sold her Bel-Air home for close to $30 million.
–Madonna’s former home in Beverly Hills, which was redone by Diane Keaton, just shut at almost $17 million.
–Comedy writer Bill Richmond has purchased a town house overlooking the lake in Calabasas Park for close to its asking price of $1.3 million.
–Gregory Joujon-Roche, a celebrity personal trainer, has listed his Malibu condo for $2.695 million. The listing is here, the home is freshly redecorated and gorgeous.
–Peter Shin, supervising director of the TV show “Family Guy,” has bought a contemporary-style house for $1.3-plus million in the Hollywood Hills.

From the Wall Street Journal’s Private Properties:
–Fashion designer Kenzo has put his Paris home on the market for 12 million euros. it is our estate of the day later today.

From the NY Times Huge Deal:
–The buyer of Ricky Martin’s former apartment in the Time Warner Center have signed a contract to flip it for around $17.9 million. Martin bought it in 2004 for $6.8 million and sold it in September 2006 for $9.75 million.
–Fewer than a third of the 201 coveted apartments in Robert A. M. Stern’s complex 15 Central Park West near the foot of Central Park, at West 61st Street, have now closed. But of those, five apartments were put back on the market almost instantly and more listings are likely.

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Filed under: Estates

This home in the seaside village of Watch Hill, Rhode Island seems to have been pressed into service as some sort of hotel or corporate retreat. The Chateau Ste. Michelle Estate is on a 4.82 acre parcel of land. The home was built in 1930 and then renovated in 1992. It has 14 bedrooms total with 15 full baths and another five half baths and there’s an industrial kitchen huge enough to feed all those people. The home also includes a pool table room, bar room and conference room. Outside there are tennis courts and an in-ground pool as well as breathtaking views of the Atlantic. It looks like it would take a bit of effort to turn this back into a family home. This estate is listed at $10.9 million.

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Homes like this in Boston don’t come on the market too often. This stately brick townhouse is located on Beacon Street opposite the Public Garden. The home was built in 1846 for former Secretary of the Navy Benjamin Crowninshield and must have been the height of fashion and luxury at the time. The home went through a major renovation in 1990. The renovation seems to have included the huge kitchen that has French doors opening out onto the garden. Other features include a library, a billiard room with a wet bar, a dining room with a dumb waiter and a caterer’s kitchen. The top floor includes a huge modern gym that includes a hot tub and steam shower. There is also a roof deck with great Back Bay skyline views.The listing says that there’s outdoor parking on a private street. This might mean some major parking hassles in the winter, but what you are paying for here are all the vintage details, the curlicued plaster medallions on the ceiling, nine Tiffany-designed stained glass windows and some of the most gorgeous woodwork I have ever seen. The staircase alone is worthy of poetry and those tufted velvet built-in seats next to the large fireplace are so evocative of the time period this home was built in that they seem to be part of an oil painting.. There are five bedrooms total and ten fireplaces. There are some strange quirks, too, such as a rather coffin-like bathtub. But with an old beauty of a house like this, you have to embrace the quirks. It is listed at $6.9 million.

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Filed under: Estates

Today’s home has me pondering the problems associated with older homes. Here we have Up Holland, a nice nearly 20-acre spread near St. Michaels, Maryland. The historic home is believed to date from the late 1700s and is part of a land allow patented ca. 1667 . The six-bedroom home has been added to and altered over the years and now has a Greek Revival facade with a two story porch. The home has a formal living room and library with fireplaces and nine foot ceilings. The dining room is believed to be the oldest part of the home and has wood floors, wood-burning fireplace, old doors and a back stairway. The country kitchen has a brick fireplace and a table. The home is in need of a major overhaul, I just wonder how much can be done to bring it into the modern age. In its current state the home seems to be a patchwork of its various additions and renovations. I might direct potential new owners to Tusculum, a former estate of the day that’s an older home that has been elegantly recreated. The home also has a carriage house that has two garage bays, a greenhouse/potting shed and a second floor studio. The land includes a swimming pool and pool house and a wide pier on Broad Creek provides anchorage for several boats. The home is listed at $3.485 million.

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Real estate in the Says might be having tough times but in Canada things seem to be booming and we’re seeing more incredible estates all over the country. This one in Metchosin in Greater Victoria, British Columbia is one of the most expensive. The home was completed in 2006 and sits on 67 acres. The design received a National Canadian Architect Award. The design is a mix on interior and outdoor design that includes pools of water which are part of a geothermal heating and air conditioning system that pulls water from the ocean and runs through the house. The water also divides the living and bedroom areas. The home is quite striking, if perhaps a bit chilly looking. I love the giant red sofas in the living room area. The estate includes a guest house, boat house, covered pool, and a tennis court. It is listed at $24 million Canadian.

Continue reading Swanwick Ranch, Estate of the Day

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This stately home in the Pacific Heights area of San Francisco hit the market earlier this month. The Neo-Classic mansion sits high on a hill and was designed by Houghton Sawyer in 1912 for sugar baron Adolph Spreckels and his wife Alma, as their first residence. The five-bedroom mansion has Bay views and has been retrofitted for seismic integrity. The photos reveal that in many areas the original wood work and beautiful moldings have been retained. As faithful readers know, I love a good library and this one is a beauty with a fireplace and plenty of shelves. The kitchen seems less than inspired, it looks enjoy it belongs in some other home, certainly not a home worth this much money. And, while I’m finding fault, I can’t comprehend why someone would take a home like this and then install tiny round ceiling lights. I like light as much as the next person but in a home with good bones like this, modern round lights set flush into the ceiling are an abomination. This home is listed at $25 million. Zillow’s zestimate is screamingly off here, they’ve got it at close to $4 million.

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What attracts me to this home, billed as a “gentleman’s ranch” in Spicewood, Texas, is the sense of space. The center of the home is anchored by a large great room that is ringed with limstone archways that lead to other rooms. The main house has been designed for two with the guests ensconced in a separate six-bedroom guest house. The main house is designed for pleasing on a grand scale. The kitchen is huge and there’s also a 1,500 bottle wine room and a big pantry. The Owner’s suite includes a separate living room and study, sleeping quarters and a hobby room. The master loo is a bit kooky with one of those round tubs which seems to be put in front a shower area. The property is 18 acres total and the rest of the buildings are clustered around the pool and patio area which includes a summer kitchen with a grill, refrigerator, sink and granite countertops. The land also includes a six-car garage with attic and closet space plus a half bath. This home is listed at $4.25 million.

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