Architect to the stars: Architect Richard Landry, left, he recently finished Hollywood actor Mark Wahlberg's, right, French manor-style mansion in Beverly Hills. Landry has designed many celebrity houses
When Hollywood celebrities start planning to build their extravagant mansions and perfect faux palaces, there is one person they all turn to: Richard Landry.
The famous architect to the stars is currently putting the last touches on his most recent Hollywood project for actor Mark Wahlberg, who head-hunted him two years ago to create his dream home on his 6-acre piece of prime Beverly Hills property in Beverly Park.
The Quebec-born architect has designed houses for an abundance of celebrities, including Gisele Bundchen and Tom Brady, Wayne Gretzky, Adrienne Maloof, Sugar Ray Leonard, Michael Bolton and Rod Stewart, among many others. He also designed the house where Michael Jackson spent his last days before he died.
In a rare interview, he shares his secrets of success in Tinseltown and why all the stars go to him.
He says he never makes the same house twice and cookie-cutting is just not his style.
And he would never dream of repeating a floor plan.
‘I never copy myself. Nobody else has a Gisele house, even if they wanted it.’
Wahlberg's house is a $14 million French manor-style mansion with a home theatre, wine cellar, large-scale gym, a double-height, wood-paneled library, a putting green and a large, rock-scaped pool with a waterfall and diving rock that Landry had built into the hillside location.
There is also a 2,200-square-foot loggia with coffered ceilings, limestone floors and a fireplace. The only thing the outdoor room will lack, Landry says, are glass windows, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
The project, which has been under construction for nearly two years with builder John Finton, emcompasses 30,000 square feet of indoor space, including the main house and the guest buildings.
It is a step up from Wahlberg’s former Beverly Hills residence, which sold in October for $12.995 million and measured a mere 11,500 square feet.
Landry’s last project was supermodel Gisele Bundchen and footballer husband Tom Brady’s eco-manse in Brentwood, which is almost half the size of Wahlberg’s new home.
Step up: Wahlberg's former Beverly Hills residence was sold in October for $12.995 million and measured 11,500 square feet
Eco-manse: Landry's last project was supermodel Gisele Bundchen and her footballer
husband Tom Brady's mansion in Brentwood, which is almost half the size of Wahlberg's
new home
But for Landry, it is not about the bigger the better.
‘My goal always has to go with finding the right proportions. It is not about building bigger
and bigger homes,’ says Landry to the Hollywood Reporter.
In the case of Wahlberg’s house, he says there are ‘no ginormous rooms’.
‘There’s no ballroom, no bowling alley, no indoor basketball court. I've done most of those
kinds of things in other projects, but here it's really a good traditional family house with no
craziness to it.’
The architect is also doing projects around the world, including a 32,000-square-foot
contemporary in Bahrain, a 200,000-square-foot French-style single-family home near
Shanghai and a 250,000-square-foot, eight-building, hypermodern compound in Riyadh,
Saudi Arabia.
Landry has designed houses for the likes of hockey legend Wayne Gretzky, right, and singer Rod Stewart, left
Landry has also created the homes for Sugar Ray Leonard, right, and billionaire Egyptian media mogul, Haim Saban, left
The extravagant home of Haim Saban, who is estimated to be worth $3.4 billion,designed by Landry
As was hockey star Wayne Gretzky's $14.9 million house
An interior glimpse of Wayne Gretzky's plush home, which was designed for him by Landry in 2002. The house has since been sold
Gretzky chose Landry to design his home and the outcome was fabulous
A look at Sugar Ray Leonard's house shows quite the property
Rod Stewart certainly didn't hold back when he asked Landry to design his house
Then there's the high-end subdivision in Qingdao, China, that will include 40 homes that
will be 25,000 square feet each.
‘For all of these, I'll be using the same materials I use here -- French limestone, bronze
windows, Vermont slate. Those are the kinds of products going into these homes,’ he says.
Countless other projects in China, Malaysia and Japan also are being developed by Landry,
along with his staff of 45.
He says he is very passionate about smaller projects.
Same designer: Football player Tom Brady and supermodel Gisele Bundchen also had their
house designed by Landry
‘We just finished a 4,000-square-foot guest cottage in Malibu. It was just a little folly, and
that is just as fun for me.’
Landry has been on the Architectural Digest's AD100 list four times since 2000 and in
2004 he was presented with the prestigious Stars of Design award from the Pacific Design
Center. In 2007 he became a part of the ‘Robb Report Recommended’ list of best architects,
and in 2013, a bluffside 23,000-square-foot mansion he designed in Malibu with views of Lake Sherwood and the Santa Monica Mountains, was selected by Robb Report as their Ultimate
Home in 2013. Landry also designed the home of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Adrienne Maloof, who ended up selling it for an astounding $20 million dollars.
Extravagant: Landry also designed the home of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills star Adrienne
Maloof which had a purple staircase in the lobby.
Many homes: Landry designed the house that Michael Jackson, left, spent his last days
while preparing for his tour. The architect also designed the home where Maloof, right,
lived, which was sold for $20 million
The French chateau-style estate was purchased for $12.708 million in 2004. The eight
bedroom, 11 bathroom estate had been featured often on her hit reality show, and it
boasts a wine cellar, gym and screening room, a pool, and a guest house.
Landry also famously designed the house in which Michael Jackson spent his last days
before his death in 2009.
The bed in which Jackson died and hundreds of other items from the California mansion,
where he prepared for a series of comeback concerts, were put up for auction in
December 2011 in Los Angeles.
Michael Jackson's deathbed in the house designed by Landry
Velvet goldmine: Contents of Michael Jackson's sprawling home, designed by Landry
Top buy: Landry was also the creative brain behind one of the country's most expensive
homes, which was sold for $150 million
Fine details: Glass mosaic tiles were imported from Italy for the house
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