The lives of the rich and famous are rarely as glamorous as advertised. Their homes, however, often live up to the billing.<\/p>\n
Courtesy Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n
Hollywood has always been obsessed with appearances. In the studio era, romance was something cast, polished and, when necessary, rewritten. Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Taylor’s marriage was reportedly one such production. <\/p>\n
She was Hollywood\u2019s whip-smart queen of noir, amassing nearly 90 film credits and, by 1944, becoming America\u2019s highest-paid woman. He was a matinee idol with looks so immaculate his nickname was \u201cThe Man with the Perfect Profile.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Taylor represented the height of Hollywood fame. On paper, their union made perfect sense in every way but the important one: love. Still, they found themselves sharing one of Los Angeles\u2019 most enviable homes.<\/p>\n
Los Angeles Public Library<\/p>\n
It was Hollywood at full tilt. The Wizard of Oz. Gone With the Wind. MGM had become the dream factory of American cinema. Off-screen, however, the studio was busy with some other acts of pretending.<\/p>\n
The trouble began with a fan magazine. Photoplay\u2019s feature Hollywood\u2019s Unmarried Husbands and Wives<\/a> outed several of the era\u2019s most bankable couples\u2014Clark Gable and Carole Lombard among them\u2014for the crime of cohabitating without paperwork. Within months, MGM married off Stanwyck and Taylor under the cloak of night. What followed was 12 years of the most convincing marriage, one that many believe was never truly cast by love. <\/p>\n But behind the carefully staged photographs and magazine covers sat a very real house. Today, that Holmby Hills estate<\/a> has returned to the market, asking $39.95 million. Its architecture, much like its previous owners, has a penchant for misdirection.<\/p>\n A broad expanse of lawn here offers more than greenery. It offers profoundly pleasant privacy.<\/p>\n Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n The first secret is easy to miss. A detached guest house, tucked so deftly beneath vine-draped stonework that it reveals itself only after you\u2019ve nearly walked past it. In many ways, it sets the tone for everything that follows.<\/p>\n A mahogany-paneled library conceals a screening room behind its walls, while two hidden doors dissolve into the millwork, one opening onto a private wet bar. It\u2019s easy to picture the clink of cocktail glasses here after supper. <\/p>\n Hidden behind secret doors in the library, a screening room gives the house an appropriately cinematic twist. Robert Taylor counted Ronald Reagan among his closest friends, close enough that the future president delivered a eulogy at Taylor’s funeral in 1969.<\/p>\n Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n The eccentricities continue upstairs. A multi-panel Chinese screen disguises a study. An outdoor terrace is accessible only by passing through one of two adjoining bathrooms. Future owners could rearrange the labyrinthine layout to make rooms for additional bedrooms, says listing agent James Harris<\/a> of Carolwood Estates<\/a>. Yet it\u2019s these peculiar moments that give the house its personality.<\/p>\n The fireplace and beamed ceiling keep the mood intimate. The room\u2019s proportions, meanwhile, are generous enough to let a party divide itself naturally.<\/p>\n Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n Not that the primary suite lacks for comforts. Occupying its own wing, it\u2019s comparable to a private apartment, complete with a carved stone fireplace, dual dressing rooms, two soaking baths and a sauna. Perhaps most delightfully, there\u2019s an antique barber\u2019s chair tucked into its own grooming alcove. Old Hollywood enough yet?<\/p>\n The craftsmanship throughout belongs unmistakably to another era. Hand-hewn ceiling beams span the formal rooms while wrought iron traces elegant scrollwork along the staircases. Masonry fireplaces anchor the principal living spaces with an almost monastic solidity. <\/p>\n One of two soaking tubs faces the terrace, inviting equal allegiance to indoors and out.<\/p>\n Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n French doors stretch along the bedroom, lending openness to an otherwise intimate retreat.<\/p>\n Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n Then the house changes again. Down a sequence of barrel-vaulted brick arches you find a billiards lounge and a bar evoking the feeling of an old Tuscan cantina. Behind thick walls, a wine cellar shelters bottles against the heat. Continue a little farther and you\u2019ll stumble across something far less romantic: a bomb shelter. Even Hollywood\u2019s grandest estates weren\u2019t immune to the anxieties of the late 1930s. An original elevator still serves every floor\u2014including the attic\u2014for anyone willing to trust 90-year-old machinery.<\/p>\n A bar and a billiards room. Consider it double indemnity.<\/p>\n Courtesy Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n If the interiors were designed to keep the world at bay, the gardens do the opposite. More than an acre of mature grounds stretch into broad lawns, vine-covered pergolas and a Baja-shelf pool that spills into a weathered stone waterfall. The former screening room now serves as a gym. But if dumbbells aren\u2019t your preferred method of staying fit, a tennis court still carries floodlights of an intensity Los Angeles no longer allows for matches long after dusk.<\/p>\n It wouldn\u2019t be a proper Los Angeles hideaway without a pool. This one has the good sense not to be a boring rectangle.<\/p>\n Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n The house isn\u2019t even the street\u2019s only monument to a marriage that didn’t survive it. A few doors down is the former home of Fanny Brice, purchased by Robbie Williams in 2022. A mile away sits Owlwood<\/a>, once incidentally the home of Marilyn Monroe and Tony Curtis (no connubial connection), which outlasted Sonny and Cher by decades. <\/p>\n In a Hollywood house of such historical significance, there’s a secret to discover behind almost every door.<\/p>\n Carolwood Estates<\/p>\n For some golden couples, it turns out, time brings tarnish. The houses they leave behind\u2014full of hidden doors and secret rooms built for keeping things from each other\u2014appear to win in the longer run.<\/p>\n Priced at $39.95 million, the listing for 423 N Faring Road<\/a> <\/a>is held by James Harris<\/a> and Sam Collins<\/a> of Carolwood Estates<\/a>. Carolwood Estates is a member of Forbes Global Properties<\/a>, an invitation-only network of top-tier brokerages worldwide and the exclusive real estate partner of Forbes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The lives of the rich and famous are rarely as glamorous as advertised. 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