Inside a California mansion fit for a royal: Italian villa Il Sogno in Bel-Air, the former home of real estate millionaire Howard Ruby and Hollywood star Yvette Mimieux
- The lucky buyer of the US$45 million home will be neighbours with celebrities like Beyoncé and Jay-Z, Tesla CEO Elon Musk and Jennifer Aniston
- Its interior designer, Kalef Alaton, worked with Marilyn Monroe and Frank Sinatra, while florist David Jones was Elizabeth Taylor and Jackie Kennedy’s first choice
Located in one of Los Angeles’ prettiest neighbourhoods is, arguably, one of California’s prettiest estates: Il Sogno was once the Bel-Air home of Hollywood glitterati Howard F. Ruby and his wife Yvette Mimieux.
Originally built in the 1920s, Ruby bought the 12,000 sq ft Italianate compound in 1979 and Mimieux moved in when the couple married in 1986. Mimieux was a familiar face on cinema and television screens from the 1960s to the 80s, racking up three Golden Globe nominations along the way, and her husband Ruby made a name for himself as the father of corporate housing – better known as serviced flats – as founder, chair and CEO of Oakwood Worldwide.
Il Sogno is an outlier in chic Bel-Air. Once likened by Ruby to a Fabergé egg, the house has a singularly ornate style that stands apart from the ultra-modern designs that currently dominate the neighbourhood. Perched on a 42,000 sq ft lot on Perugia Way – around the corner from the Bel-Air Country Club, just north of UCLA and west of Downtown LA – the six-bedroom, eight-bathroom house boasts a library, a function room the size of a ballroom and a four-car garage. Designed to recall a villa that might overlook Italy’s Amalfi Coast, Il Sogno’s interiors are as lush as the leafy surroundings that envelop the house.
Designed by Turkish-born, Paris-educated Kalef Alaton, the house’s unapologetically ornamental interiors bring his work at the Hotel Bel-Air and Melbourne’s Park royal Hotel to mind, marrying vintage and contemporary elements to achieve his defining eclectic style (which he also applied to homes for Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra and philanthropist Simon Beriro). Every Alaton project incorporates European antiques, bespoke items, animal prints and luxurious materials, often in every room, giving projects a lavishly grand yet comfortable ambience.
Il Sogno is classic Alaton. Starting behind a delicate wrought iron gate at the main entrance, at the end of a stony circular driveway, visitors could easily be overwhelmed by the volume of detail that unfolds amid the marble and ceramic statues, creeping vines and pottery that dot the path leading to the front door. But Alaton’s careful curation soon reveals itself.