Brandon Boyd Double Whammy: One

SELLER: Brandon Boyd
LOCATION: Venice, CA
PRICE: $3,195,000
SIZE: 3,500 square feet (approx.), 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: Brandon Boyd—writer, artist and plaintively-voiced front man for mainstream rock band Incubus—may hail from the archetypal-suburban streets of Calabasas, CA but he's long made his home in the nitty gritty beach community of Venice (CA) where in August 2011 he put his arty-farty if prohibitively pricey for most artists residence on the market with an optimistic $3,495,000 price tag. In early December, a few months after he dropped almost three million bucks to snatch up another house in Venice—more on that later—the rather becoming, sinewy slender and fearlessly tattooed Mister Boyd dropped the asking price of his boho beach side bedsit to it's current figure of $3,195,000.

Listing information indicates the once-commercial two-story structure was built in 1905 and used as a hotel "sometime in the 1940s." Your Mama was told or read somewhere—we can't recall which—the building once operated as a bordello but we aren't able to verify the veracity of such so we don't recommend the children spread that bit about without a caveat. Anyhoo, property records and previous reports on the matter reveal Mister Boyd's abode—situated a short block from the beach and, by Your Mama's assessment, desirably unconventional—was briefly owned by two-time Golden Globe nominated actress Maria Bello (Prime Suspect, ER, A History of Violence, The Cooler) who owned the unorthodox domicile for only 13 months (or so) and sold it in November 2005 at a near quarter-million dollar profit to Mister Boyd for $2,715,000.

The exterior of the mint green structure belies little of the bohemian luxury inside the fully-renovated and upgraded concrete- and cork-floored crib that feature 3 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms, airy 12-foot high pressed tin ceilings with articulated moldings, earthquake-retrofitted exposed brick walls and low-key but high-brow kitchen and bathrooms that resonate of a quasi-industrial upscale Parisian garret, if there is such a thing as a quasi-industrial upscale Parisian garret.

The residence sits hard up on the street with nary an inch of buffer between the sidewalk and the front door opens that directly into the spacious main living space. Mister Boyd (or his nice, gay or lady decorator) wisely installed some sort of curved screen between the front door and the base of the staircase. Not only does the ancient art of Feng Shui require such an interjection to keep the money from flowing right down the stairs and out the front door, it adds a much needed smidgen of visual concealment from anyone who may be walking along the street when the front door is opened.

The "formal" living room, not surprising littered with musical instruments and chock-a-block with art and other objects that ooze with Mister Boyd's personal interests and fascinations, may suffer from a lack of clear glass windows—glass block was used on the exterior wall to maintain privacy but still bring natural light in to the room—but does benefits from a full wall of built in bookshelves filled with actual books and other ephemera that may or may not include some avian taxidermy. A clean-lined, custom-built floating steel staircase with chunky wood treads provides the necessary tension between the vintage nature of the original architecture and the kick-up your feet casual (if costly) and animal skin-draped day-core.

A towering pair of solid wood raised panel doors connect the living room to the ample, open plan combination dining room and kitchen kitted out in High Urban Loft style with simple, white Shaker-style cabinetry and commercial stainless steel appliances that include a restaurant-grade sink, super-size range with separate griddle, and a $10,000 glass-fronted Sub-Zero fridge/freezer that makes Your Mama sweat and swoon with unrequited appliance lust. Several sets of French doors connect to a narrow ground level courtyard tiled with Mexican pavers, hung with a myriad of cheap capiz shell chandeliers and furnished with a variety of wired things that include a vibrant, sunshine yellow cafe table and chairs.

Reclaimed warehouse-type windows line portions the upper level landing where the cork floors extend into the street-facing master suite complete with oddly off-center fireplace, exposed brick walls and pressed tin ceiling. Mister Boyd's boo-dwar offers the style maven a boo-teek sized and naturally-lit closet/dressing room and a beauteous bathroom designed by "a famous local architect" according to listing information and finished with well-worn antique herringbone wood floors—like one might find in a quasi-industrial upscale Parisian garret—white subway tiles smartly grouted in a contrasting grey, twin sinks atop a Jean Prouvé-inspired base, and a fireplace with tile surround adjacent to a free-standing soaking tub set into a greenhouse-like nook with steel-framed frosted glass wall and ceiling.

Listing photographs show Mister Boyd used a large, sky-lit space at the upper rear of the residence as a den/office area and a separate detached addition at the back of the property encompasses a two-car garage that opens to an alleyway and a 640 square foot sound-proofed music studio/guest quarters wrapped in theatrical red curtains and conveniently equipped with a kitchenette.

An unadorned exterior staircase, the sort of thing one might expect to find tucked into an unseen section of an office building or civic structure, climbs up to a wood-decked roof top terrace with an elevated, pergola-shaded shelter perfect for lounging, napping and—for those so inclined—getting frisky outdoors. Tall corrugated metal fencing along the sides may look a bit harsh to those who prefer more traditionally residential materials—we happen to l.o.v.e. the utilitarian nature of the humble and undulating material—but does ensure privacy for anyone who might like to soak up the sun and/or have an open air lunch snack and beverage in their birthday suits. Listing information indicates the roof deck is plumbed for a spa—a feature that pleases our mate The Dr. Cooter to no end—and there's a peek-a-boo view of the glimmering Pacific Ocean over the urban chaos of the surrounding roof tops and telephone wires.

We're not sure why Mister Boyd would want to vacate this obviously much-treasured residence in Venice for another, slightly smaller (and much more polished) loft-like residence in Venice located just over a mile away, significantly farther from the beach and much closer to the busy Abbot Kinney shopping and dining district. But, if we've said it once we've said it 78 times too many, such are the sometimes inexplicable and frequently capricious real estate ways of the rich and famous.

listing photos: Abbot Kinney Real Estate

Kobe Bryant Loses Three Mansions in Divorce

In 2003 L.A. Laker Kobe Bryant was accused of assaulting a 19-year old woman in a Colorado hotel room. Mister Bryant denied the charges and claimed the sexual relations were consensual. The salacious charges were dropped a year later after the woman declined to move forward with a trial but not before the professional dribbler apologized to his wife for his sexual indiscretion with a $4,000,000 eight-carat purple diamond ring. His impending divorce, however, will cost the well-compensated shooting forward and 5-time NBA champion far more than a four million dollar finger sparkler.

All the celebrity-based blogs and sports-oriented websites are abuzz today with the news that Bryant's soon-to-be ex-wife Vanessa will receive all three of the couple's luxurious Orange County cribs as part of her reported (and alleged) $75,000,000 divorce settlement.

Your Mama, as we are sometimes want to do, did a little digging around in the property records and determined that Mister and soon-to-be ex-Missus Bryant together owned a total three mansions of varying values, all within 5 minute drive of each other, nestled into upscale Newport Coast area in the mountains above the Pacific Ocean just below the hoity-toity beach community of Newport Beach.

The self-dubbed Black Mamba and his then teenage bride bought his first house near Newport Beach (shown above) in October 2001, according to property records, for $1,700,000. The Orange County Tax Man shows the gated, U-shaped two-story mansion, tucked into the tail end of a tiny cul-de-sac in a gated Pelican Ridge development. Records show the house was completed in 1997, sits a .47 acre hillside parcel with roof top and mountain views, measures around 6,500 square feet, and contains a total of 6 bedrooms. The palm tree-dotted back yard wraps around two sides of the house and includes various entertainment terraces, built-in barbecue center, small but lush lawns, and free-form swimming pool and spa.

Documents Your Mama had a long look at online show the property was transferred from Mister Bryant into soon-to-be ex-Missus Bryant's name in early January 2012.

In July 2003, the couple spent $2,650,000 to purchase another, smaller but still large home two short blocks away in the same upscale gated enclave of Pelican Ridge. Records indicate the house is slammed on to a tight .29 acre plot and a recent report in the New York Post indicates it's occupied by soon-to-be ex-Missus Bryant's momma.

Documents available online show this house was also transferred into soon-to-be ex-Missus Bryant's sole ownership on the very same day in early January (2012) as the above mentioned abode.

In June 2008, Mister and Missus Bryant purchased, through a trust, a not-yet completed mansion just 1.5 miles away in the much ritzier (and, natch, guard-gated) Pelican Crest planned development. Records show the house, listed at $10,900,000, was snatched up for $9,540,000.

Listing information from the the time of the sale that Your Mama managed to tease up out of the interweb shows the then (and still) under construction 4-floor ocean view mansion was designed with more than 14,000 square feet of "Santa Barbara style living" that includes and elevator, 6 bedrooms, 9 full and 3 half bathrooms, subterranean parking for six luxury whips, a basement level with media, game, wine and music rooms plus and office and staff suite, and a sub-basement level with exercise room, sauna and steam facilities, and a game court.

It's not clear to Your Mama if Mister and soon-to-be ex-Missus Bryant made any alterations to the plans for the Richard Krantz-designed domicile but a February 2011 article in the Orange County Register revealed that the home was then still under construction with a myriad of permits filed for various revisions.

Once again, online documents we perused show soon-to-be ex-Missus Bryant became the sole owner of this property on the same day in early January (2012) as did the other to previously mention properties.

What soon-to-be ex-Missus Bryant would want her trio of large and high-maintenance mansions and what she plans to do with them is, at this point, a mystery. However it certainly would not surprise Your Mama in the slightest if she eventually sold all three and moved her, her momma and kids into another pricey and posh pad in the area because, well, that's how the rich and famous often roll.

aerial photos (top and middle): Google
aerial and exterior photos (bottom): Orange County Register

Vanna White's Ex Lists Palatial Beverly Park Pad

SELLER: George Santo Pietro
LOCATION: Beverly Hills, CA
PRICE: Make Him An Offer
SIZE: 14,554 square feet, 8 bedrooms, 10 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: A little birdie came chirp chirp chirpin' along the other day and tittered in Your Mama's ear that restaurateur and property developer George Santo Pietro—better known, perhaps, as the ex-husband of be-gowned Wheel of Fortune letter turner Vanna White—appears to have quietly floated his behemoth mansion in Beverly Hills' Beverly Park community on the market with an undisclosed price tag.

We quickly queried a few of our better contacts in the Platinum Triangle—the pricey pocket of Los Angeles comprised of the Beverly Hills, Holmby Hills and Bel Air communities—who often know the what's-what up in Beverly Park. We quickly heard back from an exceedingly well connected (and much valued) informant—let's call him Ned Knowshisstuff—who told Your Mama that word on the Bev Hills real estate street is that Mister Santo Pietro hasn't put an official asking price on the property, asking instead that interested parties "make him an offer he can't refuse." With all due respect, bitch pleeze. Come on now Mister Santo Pietro. You and Your Mama both know that ain't no way to sell a damn house, even a gigantic one like yours. It's just a way to ensure you feel indignant with insult when some bargain hunting billionaire offers half the amount you really want for the house.

Property records we peeped reveal Mister Santo Pietro first acquired the land in 1995 with his then-wife Vanna White. The erstwhile pair, who made a couple of kiddies together before the divorced in 2002, paid a member of the Saudi royal family $2,050,000 for the 5.076 acre spread near the northern gates of the guard-gated community of steroidal (mega-)mansions.

Deeds and documents we perused aren't entirely clear about if ex-Missus Santo Pietro—that would be Vanna White—still maintains a financial stake in the Beverly Park property but we  do know Miz White now lives in the nearby, guard-gated and star-stocked Mulholland Estates enclave in a significantly smaller but still undeniably gigantic 8,988 square foot Mediterranean mansion just a couple doors down from a similarly-sized and styled mansion long owned by troubled Tinseltown scion and sometimes volatile actor Charlie Sheen. Mister Sheen, celebrity real estate watcher surely recall, bought a larger house in the Mulholland Estates 'hood last year and briefly had his old house—the one a couple doors down from Vanna White—on the market last year with a $7,200,000 asking price.

Anyhoo, the Los Angeles County Tax Man indicates Mister Santo Pietro's crab-shaped mansion, a titanic Tuscan-style structure, was custom-built in 1997 with 14,554 square feet and 8 bedrooms and 10 bathrooms. Since there's almost no information available on the listing agent Mauricio Umansky's website and the property is not currently listed on the MLS, it's impossible for Your Mama to know if those numbers are entirely accurate the the home's current configuration. Suffice to say the crib is colossal and there are plenty enough bedrooms and bathrooms to comfortably house 2 families and require a part-time minimum wage girl whose only responsibilities are scrubbing terlits and making beds.

Photos of the property on the listing agent's website—the beau-hunky reigning real estate agent king of Beverly Park who stars on The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills with his wife Kyle Richards and who listed three of the most recent properties to sell in the community of bulky and bloated private residences—show a cavernous entrance hall with double staircase, spacious formal living and dining rooms done up with Old World oil paintings, dozens of gilded Louis the Something chairs, and at least two fringe-trimmed velvet upholstered tie-back sofas. Beyond the formal living room, in the much cozier, men's clubby library the walls and ceiling are paneled in dark wood (that may or may not be mahogany or some other more exotic wood) with built-in lighted book cases and the herringbone patterned wood floors are covered in antique rugs and animal skins.

Less formal and family quarters comprise an open plan eat-in kitchen and family room festooned with red silk and fringed onion-shaped Chinese lanterns. The ceiling gives off an air of architectural authenticity with antique rough-hewn beams while a wood-burning fireplace with regal, carved stone chimney piece anchors the cluttered family room area at one end of the roomy room and a long row of industrial ranges runs along the entire back wall of the kitchen. A massive, u-shaped center island has a stool-height snack counter and double dishwashers. A jumbo (and truly terrifying) pot rack over the sink area would require Your Mama take out an extra life insurance policy just to run the dog's water bowl under the tap. We'll say nothing more of the two, cheap-looking plastic garbage bins inexplicably placed at the two ends of the center island.

A basement level wine cellar and lounge concrete floors, arched and vaulted brick ceiling, lots of tufted furniture and what appears to be and must be a knock off painting of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, the original of which, as we all know, hangs permanently in the Musée du Louvre in Paris. It was here in this very wine cellar in early 2011 where hard partying Hollywood hot shot Charlie Sheen, just about to embark on a 36-hour bender, reportedly offered to rent Mister Santo Pietro's big ol' Beverly Park mansion at a rate of a quarter million clams a month so he could house the so-called "porn family" he wanted to create. Mister Sheen's minders quickly put the kibosh on that deal according to the folks at gossip juggernaut TMZ.

Photographs of Mister Santo Pietro's house on real estate agent Mauricio Umansky's website shows a vast master suite, probably in itself larger than the average American home, that encompasses a ballroom-sized bedroom with fireplace, sitting area, access to a deep covered balcony with over the tree top canyon view, and a separate office furnished with a gilded desk that looks like it could might have once been owned by a gold-loving Russian czar. There's also a small fitness chamber and a large Asian-themed massage room, a garage-sized closet lined with custom-built cabinetry, and at least one oval-shaped bathroom with inlaid marble floor, gorgeous glass chandelier, celebrity-style make-up vanity, and a separate soaking tub and steam shower. Although we can't fathom why, the open center area of the unnecessarily roomy master bathroom is furnished like a damn living room with a sofa covered in a champagne-colored silk slipcover and a pair of lyre-back Chippendale-style chairs (that may or may not be actual Chippendales). Now children, we can certainly understand the need for a stool or even a cushioned chair in which to plop down and trim one's toe nails in the bathroom but why is it that someone might want enough seating in the bathroom to host a handful of people? Seriously? Do the wealthy enjoy an audience when they brush their teeth or pluck the hair from their nostrils? Why? But we digress into our own ignorance.

The back of Mister Santo Pietro's palatial mansion opens to a series of arched colonnades that frame views over of negative edge swimming pool and spa and over the trees to the rugged ridge lines of the surrounding mountains. Lawn areas on either side of the swimming pool provide plenty of space for trampolines and impromptu matches of strip croquet. A steep slope on the front side of the mansion is planted vineyard-style with maturing grape vines, a horticultural folly that probably costs Mister Santo Pietro more to maintain each year than Your Mama earns in an entire year.

In July 1998 Mister Santa Pietro (and then wife Vanna White) paid a few million dollars to acquire the 2.11 acre parcel next door. Records suggest Mister Santo Pietro bought out his now ex-wife Vanna White in the summer of 2004 and by 2007 he'd erected an approximately 27,000 square foot with 9 bedrooms and 14 bathrooms.

In December 2010, after first listing the house at a now-obviously optimistic $50,000,000 and after leasing for a few month it to His Purple Majesty Prince at a reported rate of $200,000 per month, Mister Santo Pietro finally sold the opulent spec-built mansion next door to his own for $22,620,000 to a married couple whose fortune derives primarily from hawking mid-priced ladies handbags on QVC.

Although the high-end real estate market in Los Angeles (and elsewhere) suffered bitterly as a result of the mortgage crisis and global economic downturn in 2007-2009 there appears to be some serious life in the old girl the last couple of years with a healthy number of transactions in Beverly Park.

In September 2011 Lisa Vanderpump and Ken Todd (of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills) sold their opulent faux-French pile for $18,800,000 and just a month later a two-house compound of 26,116 square feet once owned by Saudi Royal family member Abdul Aziz bin Adbullah went for $16,875,000.

In mid-November 2010 porn peddler Zorm Zada sold his geometric contemporary for $16,500,000 to a wildly wealthy Saudi businessman who, we were told by a Beverly Hills real estate maven, may or may not be member of the royal family and who quickly caught a severe case of The Real Estate Fickle and flipped the 11 bedroom and 18 pooper property back on the market a few months after buying with an asking price of $25,000,000. The 20,000-plus square foot compound was taken off the (open) market seven months later.

L.A.-based billionaire Tom Gores dropped $21,000,000 in late November 2010 on a 15 bathroom mansion with 20,013 square foot mansion, dubbed by the seller as The Great 78. Of course, Mister Gores already owned a slew of mansions in and around the Platinum Triangle so why he bought this one isn't known to Your Mama but such are the wacky real estate ways of the ridiculously rich.

The MLS currently shows just one Beverly Park behemoth listed on the open market, an origami-esque concrete, wood and glass contemporary on 2.83 acres, designed by California architect Rob Wellington Quigley, and currently listed at $25,000,000. The multi-winged modern manse and its various outbuildings measure in at around 16,000 square feet with a grandly scaled entertaining spaces, a de rigueur home theater, 1,000 square foot fitness/spa facility, a dozen bathrooms, 4 bedroom suites in the main house, another two in the detached two-story guest house and an additional 1 bedroom guest apartment in what listing information calls a "secluded pool house."

Undoubtedly there are several to many other estates in Beverly Park available for tour and purchase by Richie Rich types who can curry favor with the right well-connected real estate agent(s) able to gain access to any of the mega-mansions being shopped around as pocket listings.

As for Mister Santo Pietro's real estate plans, we have no idea. We might guess he's looking to downsize but then again he doens't really seem the type to downsize, does he?

listing photos: Luxury Style Photography for The Agency

Vera Wang's Glass House in the 90210

Undoubtedly any number of property snobs and surely some of the more mouthy children are gonna gripe and snipe til the cows come home about being subjected first this morning to ice queen Oksana Bauil's glitzy two bedroom condominium just outside of New York City in the suburban New Jersey community of Cliffside Park. For those folks (and everyone else) Your Mama has an afternoon peace offering.

In the late days of last summer word began to slip slide down the celebrity gossip grapevine that wedding dress designer turned lifestyle guru Vera Wang spent nearly ten million smackers on a very glassy, minimalist-minded pied-a-terre in the oh-so-trendy (if exceptionally pricey) Trousdale Estates area on the eastern edge of Beverly Hills, CA.

Listing information we scared up from the time of the sale shows the low-slung single-story residence was originally built in 1967,  exhaustively re-worked over the last three years by high-end house flipper/designer/real estate agent (and seller) Steven Hermann, and purchased by Miz Wang in August (2011) for $9,200,000.

The 4 bedroom and 4 bathroom pavilion, defined by high-gloss surfaces, voluminous spaces, and steel-framed walls of full height glass panels that suck up the sweeping views across the vast glittering sprawl Tinseltown and spill effortlessly out to the backyard entertainment spaces that include dining and sunbathing terraces, an elevated spa, in-ground swimming pool and a thin strip of well-watered lawn.

It only took a few short months for Miz Wang to roust her army of style and design mavens to whip her west coast landing pad into pristine, publication-ready shape. A recent piece in Harpers Bazaar penned by fashion writer Derek Blasberg—available online here—featured scrumptious pictures of Miz Wang's very spare Bev Hills getaway snapped by the devastatingly handsome, liberally mustachioed and generously talented photographer Douglas Friedman who maintains a image-driven blog called The Fascinator Your Mama has been rather smitten with the last few months.

While Mister Friedman's photos present a slightly more pared-down day-core than the already very spare day-core seen in the 2010 listing photographs, it appears to Your Mama's boozy and sometimes unreliable eyeballs that Miz Wang (may have) acquired and kept much of the furniture installed by Mister Hermann when the home was completed and prepped for it's unveiling in March 2011 when it was listed with a $10,900,000 price tag.

Anyhoo, in addition to her minimalist manse in Los Angeles, Miz Wang maintains a number of other properly pedigreed and exceptionally tailored residences including but not limited to a suburban mansion-sized duplex apartment at the insanely posh, unreasonably expensive and much ballyhooed building at 740 Park Avenue in New York City. Miz Wang dropped an astounding $23,100,000 on the massive apartment in late 2007 when she acquired it from the estate of her then recently deceased businessman father Cheng Ching Wang who himself owned and occupied the apartment with his wife Florence since 1983 when he paid canned soup heiress Elinor Dorrance $350,000 for the gargantuan co-op.

In case any of y'all missed the earlier link, nearly a dozen lush but brutally austere photographs of Miz Wang and her west coast abode can be seen here.

photograph: Douglas Friedman for Harper's Bazaar