Monday, March 28, 2011

Revisit: Reese Witherspoon's Country Spread and Wedding Venue


This morning, bleary eyed from a crappy night's sleep thanks to our long-bodied bitches Linda and Beverly and too-many glasses of champagne with our boozy neighbors, Your Mama awoke to read an utterly absurd headline that read "Jake Gyllenhaal Did Not Attend Reese Witherspoon's Wedding." He, reportedly, went bowling with Maroon 5 lead singer and notorious cocksman Adam Levine and a model named Mini instead. Well, duh people. Did anyone really expect Mister Gyllenhaal to go to hop in his hoopdie and head on up to Ojai, CA to watch his ex-girlyfriend get hitched to another man? Pleeze.

Anyhoo, we also awoke to several emails from the children–thank y'all very much–that (re-)linked Your Mama to the 411 on the Ojai, CA ranch owned by Miz Witherspoon where she and Hollywood agent Jim Toth tied the marriage knot. Celebrity guests that did make the trek up to Ojai and attend the nuptials are said to include Renee Zellweger, Alyssa Milano, Tobey Maguire, Salma Hayek and Robert Downey, Jr.

Your Mama discussed Miz Witherspoon's 7-acre spread and its stunning Spanish Colonial casa back in March of 2008 when property records show she purchased the property for $5,800,000. The ranchette's main house was originally designed in 1923 for glass tycoon Edmund Drummond Libbey by noted California architect Wallace Neff with later French Country style additions and out buildings by Austen Pierpont.

The house has had a number of owners since 1923 including actor/director Harold Ramis and was most recently owned and fully restored by interior designer and textile goddess Kathryn M. Ireland. Before she sold the ranch to Miz Witherspoon, Miz Ireland–who is not the supermodel turned bizness baroness Kathy Ireland–allowed House Beautiful to snap some pretty pictures of all the rooms looking dee-voon, drowning in pillows and draped with a pleasing cacophony of brightly colored fabrics.

Listing information from the time of Miz Witherspoon's 2008 purchase shows the historic and pristine property includes a 4 bedroom and 3.5 bathroom main house that wraps around a central courtyard. The Arcadian wonderland also sports includes two guest houses, each with fireplace and private facilities, gatekeeper's cottage with bath, a four-car carriage house garage, a smithy (for the blacksmith) and a walled-swimming pool and spa ringed by twisted and gnarled (but well- laced and trimmed) old-growth oak trees.

Since late 2003 Miz Witherspoon's primary residence was a 6,956 square foot house with 6 bedrooms and 9 poopers in a gated enclave in the Brentwood area of Los Angeles that records show she bought for $4,725,000. Since 2005, the actress has also owned a 6,462 square foot residence in Nashville, TN with 4 bedrooms and 6 bathrooms.

In late 2010 Miz Witherspoon, one of the highest paid actresses in all of Tinseltown, spent $6,900,000 to acquire a 2.53 acre estate in the rustic Mandeville Canyon area of Los Angeles from the incredibly bizarre actor/producer/musician/writer/martial artist/reality tee-vee star Steven Seagal. The property does not appear to have been on the open market but according to the Los Angeles County Tax man the main house was erected in 1937 and measures 6,125 square feet with 7 bedrooms and 9 poopers. Also on the property detached garages, stables, a riding ring and swimming pool.

listing photos: Crosby Doe Associates

13 comments:

DREW said...

Miz Ireland wrote a whole book about her remodel of this property -

http://www.amazon.com/Creating-Home-Kathryn-Ireland/dp/1423605950/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1301330538&sr=8-2

Anonymous said...

What a lovely place, imo.

I especially like the teeny house with the tower thingy. A guest house, maybe? That alone would suit me perfectly.

Anonymous said...

Several observations: The London Daily Mail incessantly calls this place "lavish". I regard it as nice, etc., but hardly lavish by contemporary standards.
Next: I think it would have been nice had she invited Jakey and Ryan to the wedding, to show she has no hard feelings. Of course they might not have come even so.
The Daily Mail, again, says Jakey was in a motorcycle shop at the time of the marriage. Who can know? Ryan was taking a hike with his latest girl friend.
Given the fact that her new hubby is hardly known to the public (no Wikipedia entry), I suspect once this marriage settles down no attention will be paid to either of them unless hanky panky enters the picture. (We all know who "hanky panky" is of course.)
May she enjoy wedded bliss and a new anonymity.

Anonymous said...

"one of the highest paid"....er, Mama, don't you mean "once one of the, etc.". Her fee per picture seems to have dropped by 50% recently if Vanity Fair can be trusted.

Anonymous said...

Here are Box Office Mojo figures for her recent movies:

How Do You Know... Budget 120 million; gross to date ca. 30 million (90 million in the hole)
4 Xmases.....Budget 80 million; gross to date ca. 120 million (40 million profit)
Penelope.....budget unknown; gross to date ca 10 million (profit doubtful)
Rendition.....budget unknown; gross to date 9.7 million (profit doubtful).
Appears that she isn't making anybody much money so it figures that her fee per picture has dropped from 20 million to about 10 million (if one trusts Vanity Fair's figures).

Anonymous said...

Sounds like she has more homes then she needs.....

The Devoted Classicist said...

The Wallace Neff house is fabulous. I would have preferred that the outbuildings were more in keeping with the style of the main house, but they aren't too shabby.

Anonymous said...

Kathy Ireland and Kathryn M. Ireland are two very different people!

Anonymous said...

High Chaparral looking.

lil' gay boy said...

Neff always had that special touch; no matter how vast (i.e. the Francis Marion estate), he was able to inject a note of cozy domesticity, such as the lovely windowed alcove under the stairs here.

Anonymous said...

Much of the interior architecural detailing of this house is not by Wallace Neff. Originally, this house was designed by Neff in the '20s to be a BARN. Then another architect, Austen Pierpoint, made changes in the '40s so it could be a home. Those fabulous grand stairs, for example, lead to what was originally the hay loft. Since few barns include fabulous tiled stairs to the hay loft, they were probably added in their current design by Pierpont.

Anonymous said...

She also owns the house next door to the house in Brentwood. Since
'09.

Unknown said...
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