J'adore Decor

Casa Versace

Casa Casuarina aka the Versace House was built in 1930 in Miami, Florida and modeled after the Alcazar de Colon in Santo Domingo, a residence built in 1510 by the son of Christopher Columbus and reputedly the oldest existing house in the western hemisphere.

Gianni Versace purchased the building in 1992 for $2.9 million. After receiving city approval, he demolished the hotel next door, and a two-story, 6,100-foot addition was built, transforming it into Versace's Miami Beach house.

Italian fashion designer Gianni Versace, 50, was shot to death on the steps of his mansion, Casa Casuarina, as he returned from his daily morning walk on July 15, 1997. His murderer, Andrew Cunanan, a serial killer, committed suicide shortly thereafter.

Versace's beautiful three-story house, once a playground for some of the world's best-known celebrities, is again opening its doors to the rich and fabulous.

Peter Loftin, a telecommunications billionaire, purchased the house from the Versace Estate in September 2000 for approximately $19 million and reopened it as a private club with 220 members. The initiation fee: $50,000. Now the Casa is accepting overnight reservations for its 10 guest suites with prices ranging from $1,200 to $10,000 a night. Check me in.

Visionary

Frank Owen Gehry (born Ephraim Owen Goldberg February 28, 1929) is a Pritzer Prize-winning architect based in Los Angeles.

Gehry was born into a Jewish family in Toronto, Ontario. As a young boy he was very creative and with the influence of his grandmother, Caplan, he would build little cities out of scraps of wood.

In 1947, Gehry moved to California. While he worked on a delivery truck he attended the Los Angeles City College, but eventually graduated from the University of Southern California's School of Architecture.

After graduating from USC in 1954, he spent some time away from architecture working at various jobs and service in the United States Army. He studied city planning at Harvard Graduate School of Design, but left the program early after only a year.

Still known as Frank Goldberg, he married Anita Snyder, who encouraged him to change his name to Frank Gehry. This union produced two daughters, but by the mid sixties Snyder and Gehry would divorce. In the mid seventies he married Berta, his current wife. They have two sons.

The warped forms of Gehry's structures are classified sometimes as being of the deconstructivist or "DeCon" school of postmodernist architecture. Gehry himself denies any inclinations towards this movement and claims no formal alliance to any particular movement. His buildings, including his private residence, have become tourist attractions. Many museums, companies and cities seek out Gehry's services as a mark of distinction, beyond the product he delivers.

His best known works include the titanium-covered Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, Experience Music Project in Seattle, Walt Disney Concert Hall in downtown Los Angeles, Weisman Art Museum in Minneapolis, Dancing House in Prague, Czech Republic and his private residence in Santa Monica, CA.

Although there are many criticisms of his work, Gehry is a Distinguished Professor of Architecture at Columbia University and also teaches at Yale University.