PHOTO: Lauren Sanchez and Jeff Bezos have reportedly been house-hunting in the Beverly Hills and Bel Air area. Photograph: Prodip Guha/Getty Images
Jeff Bezos has set a new property price record in Los Angeles with the purchase of a $165m Beverly Hills estate, the Wall Street Journal reported.
The Amazon founder’s purchase of the home from the media mogul David Geffen is the largest amount paid for a single-family Los Angeles-area home. The nine-acre estate originally belonged to Jack Warner, the late former president of Warner Bros Studios. Warner built up the estate’s 13,600-sq-ft Georgian-style mansion in the 1930s, reportedly with the wood floor that Napoleon was standing on when he proposed to Josephine.
Architectural Digest described the estate as “the archetypal studio mogul’s estate”, with its “expansive terraces and gardens, two guesthouses, nursery and three hothouses, tennis court, swimming pool, nine-hole golf course and motor court complete with its own service garage and gas pumps”.
he estate was often the site for a who’s who of the golden age of Hollywood. “I remember one New Year’s Eve party in 1939 or 1940,” Olivia de Havelland said in Architectural Digest. “All the men were glorious in white tie. Errol Flynn was behind the bar, Howard Hughes was my date, and Jimmy Stewart was seated on a stool. Just the four of us having our first drink of the evening. All those beautiful women dressed in wonderful elegance. Dolores Del Rio in a white satin gown that contrasted her dark hair and dark eyes. Ann Warner, herself a striking presence. Those beautiful women, looking marvelous in this wonderful setting.”
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