Yvette Mimieux’s ‘Il Sogno’ hits market for $50M

Side-by-side homes owned by the late actress Yvette Mimieux in Bel-Air have hit the market for $49.5 million.

The compound contains a nearly century-old Tuscan-style villa and a Balinese-inspired cottage at 500 – 512 Perugia Way, a parcel within an island of mansions in Bel-Air Country Club, Dirt.com reported.

The estate has been the home of corporate housing magnate Howard Ruby and his late wife Mimieux, a Los Angeles native who died in January at 80. She was famous for her role in the science fiction film “The Time Machine,” as well as “Where the Boys Are” and “Light in the Piazza.”

They called their 1.6-acre, figure-eight-shaped estate “Il Sogno – Italian for “the dream.”

It links two houses and two pools across two lots, including the 10,600-square-foot villa, a six-bedroom, seven-bath mansion built in 1928, and a 4,900-square-foot cottage with three bedrooms and five baths filled with art.

Ruby founded Oakwood Worldwide, a Los Angeles-based real estate firm that provides temporary furnished apartments. He bought Il Sogno in 1979 and had it decorated by the late design legend Kalef Alaton. Mimieux moved in after their marriage in 1986.

They bought the house next door in 2010 for $5.55 million, which Mimieux used as an art studio and library, and where she lived during her final years.

The villa was designed by architect and city planner Mark Daniels, who helped lay out Bel-Air, San Francisco’s Forest Hills and Pebble Beach’s 17 Mile Drive.

Il Sogno, one of the first homes built in the neighborhood, is a lesson in formal elegance.

Its features include hand-painted ceilings in the foyer to a painted skylight in the library, with antique plaster walls, stone-carved fireplaces, glass ceilings, cavernous rooms, and a brick wine cellar.

The master suite is highlighted by a dome of hand-painted Italian frescos by Claudio Briganti, adorned by a crystal chandelier, fireplace, a private patio, and dual bathrooms trimmed in onyx.
The cottage is its bohemian opposite, wrapped in a tropical oasis, with gardens, statues and a pair of swimming pools.
The house has a library of floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, a sky-lit living room and a sunny art studio where Mimieux created brightly colored abstract paintings. A solarium comes with a tiled fireplace. A heated lanai, with hand-painted walls, overlooks the gardens.
The Property is listed by Linda May of Hilton & Hyland, Kurt Rappaport of Westside Estate Agency, and Jade Mills of Coldwell Banker Realty.

[Dirt] – Dana Bartholomew

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