Dirt
Country star Jason Aldean sells mansion near Nashville
Platinum-selling country music hitmaker Jason Aldean has sold a comfortably luxurious mansion some 40 miles south of Nashville for exactly $7 million. Dubbed the Talley Estate, the secluded 120-acre property was acquired by Aldean and former “American Idol” contestant Brittany (Kerr) Aldean just over three years ago for $5.35 million.
The main residence, approached via a nearly mile-long concrete driveway that weaves across open fields bordered by thick woods, sits amid vast pastures with six bedrooms and 8.5 bathrooms in about 9,000 square feet. The double-height entry features a floating staircase that curls around a free-standing fish tank; a wood-paneled double-height library is lined with open shelves where the guitar-picking singer displayed his myriad professional accolades; and a combination living and dining space anchored by a huge stone fireplace flows into a country farmhouse-inspired kitchen fitted with bespoke distressed-wood cabinets. The back of the house opens to
expansive outdoor spaces that comprise a swimming pool set into travertine terracing plus an outdoor kitchen and a fire pit.
The rustic-luxe spread also offers a 10,000-square-foot equestrian facility as well as a 4,100-square-foot entertaining pavilion and guesthouse that contains two bedrooms, 1.5 bathrooms and a warehouse-size lounge with a fully equipped kitchen and a professional-grade two-lane bowling alley.
Ian Astbury, Aimee Nash Offer Cottage in the Hills
English rocker Ian Astbury, frontman of the Cult, and Australian singer-songwriter Aimee Nash, one-half of the art rock duo the Black Ryder, have a 1920s Spanish cottage tucked into a tree-shaded hillside along a winding street above L.A.’S historic Beachwood Canyon available at not quite $1.6 million. Acquired in 2012 for just under $1.1 million, the modest and attractive if not exactly inexpensive white stucco residence sits atop a street-level two- car garage with three bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms in close to 1,800 square feet.
Authentic details such as colorful tile accents and chunky carved-wood ceiling beams provide architectural interest and gravitas to the sleek, dark-stained hardwood floors and chalky white walls. The living room, flooded with filtered light through huge, multi-pane windows, features a simple but imposing fireplace. The separate dining room is informally open to an up-to- date kitchen.
With French doors to a Juliet bal- cony, the master bedroom includes a skylight-topped en suite bathroom. One of the two guest bedrooms opens to a terra cotta-tiled terrace notched into the steep hillside behind the house. A storybook stone stairway winds down to a courtyard-style patio with hot tub.
The Astbury-nashes recently upgraded their residential circumstances with the $1.65 million purchase of a 1920s Mediterranean villa in L.A.’S Los Feliz foothills sold by comedian-actor-podcaster Bill Burr.
Lars Ulrich Rocks Out of Marin County Mansion
An extravagant mansion long owned by Metallica co-founder and drummer Lars Ulrich, in the posh San Francisco suburb of Tiburon, has come to market at $12 million. Property records indicate the Danish heavy metal maestro has owned the spectacularly sited manse since 1993, when it last changed hands for an unrecorded amount. Presiding over three parcels that together span more than two acres atop the peninsula community’s highest peak, with cinematic views that sweep over the San Francisco Bay from the downtown skyline to the Golden Gate Bridge, the roughly 13,000-square-foot, more-than-25-room transitional contemporary has five and potentially six en suite bedrooms and six full and three half bathrooms (as well as five fireplaces) over four floors.
A secured- entry courtyard gives way to lavishly proportioned spaces that include a marble-floored dining room that steps down to a cavernous living room with a dramatic, two-story wall of glass. A sprawling lower level incorporates a second family room with wet bar, a game room, a sound studio and a subterranean squash court. Baronial stone balustrades enhance stone terraces outside the kitchen/family room and master suite that overlook a lower terrace with swimming pool and spa.
Ulrich, who once owned a five-bedroom home in San Francisco’s Cow Hollow neighborhood, is rumored but not confirmed to be the owner of a secluded 140-plus-acre stretch of undeveloped mountaintop land near the Marin County community of Larkspur. So the scuttlebutt goes, he planned to build an ultra-modern compound but now has the undeveloped property up for sale at $39 million. Both properties are represented by Steve Mavromihalis of Compass.