The Los Angeles mansion of late Williams-Sonoma CEO W. Howard Lester. (Photo: Curbed)When W. Howard Lester died in Nov. 2010—a few short months after his 30-plus-year tenure as CEO of Williams-Sonoma had ended—he left behind The Mapleton Estate, a 20,000-square-foot mansion in Los Angeles' exclusive Holmby Hills neighborhood. Now the Med-style villa, which has "the romance of a Medici palazzo," according to a 2006 Architectural Digest feature—is on the market for the first time since Lester's death, at a $29.95 million price tag.
Lester, who expanded Williams-Sonoma from a four-store company to a 600-store one and took the kitchenwares, housewares, and furnishings brand public in 1983, bought The Mapleton Estate in 2004 and hired local interior designer Mark Boone to jazz up the decor.
(Photo: Curbed)The seven-bedroom home already had porticoes and loggias, dramatic ceilings (vaulted, coffered), stone flooring, and a truly beautiful kitchen, natch; Boone filled it with "museum-quality antique rugs," transitional Italian-inspired furnishings, and pieces from the family's extensive art collection (a de Kooning here, a Sol LeWitt there).
Next: the wine cellar, and more.
