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Video: The most expensive and largest private houses in America: What they look like and who owns
2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55
The founder of the famous clan of millionaires, Cornelius Vanderbilt, was the son of a small farmer and in his youth borrowed $ 100 from his mother to buy a barge. He managed to amass a multimillion-dollar fortune, which his descendants squandered in just three generations. One of the heirs said:. The reasons for the collapse of the richest family are believed to be an irrepressible craving for luxury and unjustifiably expensive real estate.
The decline in the wealth of the Vanderbilt family fell on the end of World War II. During the heyday in New York, they built ten mansions, but by 1947 they were all demolished. Today, almost nothing remains of the historic buildings. All that can be seen is the wrought iron gate located in Central Park, and the fireplace, along with several paintings, in the American Wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. However, several country houses have survived, which it would be more appropriate to call "palaces". The humble former owners usually referred to them as "cottages."
Marble House, Newport, Rhode Island
The three most famous Vanderbilt mansions were built by the three grandchildren of the founder of the dynasty at about the same time - between 1888 and 1895. The first of these was the foundation of the "Marble House" in Newport. This palace became the memory of a woman who tried to surpass her rivals in displaying wealth and luxury. Newport, as the summer retreat for all New York high society, was a suitable venue for this.
Mrs. Alva Vanderbilt received the Marble House as a gift from her husband for her 39th birthday, but in reality she was mainly involved in the design and construction supervision. The architect, Richard Morris Hunt, was inspired by the Little Trianon at Versailles. All facades and interiors of the house are finished with expensive types of marble. The stone was brought in specially from Italy, and it became the most expensive column of expenses for this construction.
The marble house cost a fantastic $ 11 million at the time. This is about $ 320 million today, but this amount does not reflect the real cost of the mansion, because such an estimate would require calculating the cost of materials at modern prices, and the resulting amount would most likely exceed the annual budget of a small country. This mansion is considered the most expensive private home in the United States.
Breakers, Newport
Cornelius Vanderbilt II decided to keep up with his brother and built nearby a huge mansion "Breakers", which became the largest house in Newport. The same architect created the project for him, and this time he decided to reproduce the style of the Italian palaces of the 16th century. If the goal of the American millionaires was to surpass the European aristocracy, then they undoubtedly succeeded, at least in the richness of the decoration.
Marble, rare wood species and mosaic tiles for this "summer house" were brought from different countries of the world. Some elements were taken entirely from ancient castles in France (such as several mantels). The costs increased due to the special requirements of the customer: the previous mansion on this site burned down, and Cornelius Vanderbilt demanded increased fire safety from the architect.
For these purposes, wood was almost never used in the construction - only iron, and the heating boiler was moved further away and was located in an underground space under the lawn in front of the house. Now the building is listed as a historical site and is open to the public.
Biltmore Estate
However, everyone was surpassed by the third brother, George Washington Vanderbilt II. In Asheville, North Carolina, he built a mansion that is still considered the largest private residential building in America: 250 rooms and a total area of 16,622.8 square meters. As a joke, even the servants had their own servants in this house. Such a palace can hardly be called a home, because it was built in the Chateauesque style, that is, it repeats the historical style of ancient French castles.
The ostentatious luxury of this building was even noticed by the public, although in those days wealth was not considered a vice at all, and, for example, the dinner worth a quarter of a million dollars, which was given by Mrs. Vanderbilt, was described in detail in the newspapers with admiring comments. However, the blatant expenditure required to build the Biltmore drew widespread disapproval. The Senate Committee at one time seriously considered the issue of passing a law limiting the value of a private house.
However, today Americans are very fond of their luxurious past. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Biltmore Estate is a Historic Landmark and is visited by about a million tourists every year, although it is still privately owned. This site is willingly filmed in films. For example, we can see this mansion in the movie Richie Rich.
Few people know that the most famous places and castles from Disney cartoons also have real prototypes.
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