San Francisco Decorator Showcase Home Sells for $16 Million

A sprawling Pacific Heights mansion featured at this year’s San Francisco Decorator Showcase has found a buyer.

The Pac Heights manse at 2935 Pacific Avenue sold to an unnamed buyer for $16.2 million, the San Francisco Standard reported. The property spans more than 9,000 square feet and features eight bedrooms, seven-and-a-half bathrooms, a Moroccan-themed dining room and a roof deck with a bar.

The home first went up for sale last fall but was soon taken off the market. It went back on the market when the Decorator Showcase began in late April with an asking price of $19.5 million.

A quick change of hands could mean the home sold in an all-cash deal, according to the Standard.

The Pac Heights home underwent a makeover in anticipation of the showcase and had a buyer secured by the time the showcase closed in May. Every year, the Decorator Showcase takes place in a different home to highlight the work of various interior designers in each room. Most of the homes featured are in the city’s priciest northern neighborhoods like Pac Heights, Presidio Heights and Sea Cliff.

While the mansion sold shortly after being featured, the property spotlighted in last year’s show — also in Pacific Heights — has yet to find a buyer. That Dutch Colonial home, built in 1899, has an asking price of $26 million. The house, located at 2898 Broadway, is still on the market with its original $26 million price tag.

Revamping the Broadway property for the show presented unexpected “challenges,” according to designer Geoffrey De Sousa, who leads the design board for the event and designed the living room in this year’s Pac Heights manse. The five-floor home has no garage parking or elevator and the kitchen is in an unusual spot on the upper levels. It wasn’t financially feasible to make those changes in time for the show.

“There really isn’t anything beyond our abilities,” de Sousa told the Standard. “We just need the time and money.”

As seen with the latest Pac Heights sale, being featured in the showcase can have an “extremely positive effect, both in terms of exposure and goodwill,” according to Steven Mavromihalis of Compass, who has represented several Decorator Showcase homes in the past.

But a lot of eyes can also prove to be a hurdle for some.

“A lot of very affluent people would much rather not purchase a home that has been visited by thousands of adoring fans of architecture and design,” he said.

— Chris Malone Méndez