Is Hedi Slimane over L.A.?
Is Hedi Slimane’s love affair with Los Angeles petering out?
The French designer, who became artistic, creative and image director of Celine at the beginning of the year, has quietly put his gated mid-century steel and glass house in the exclusive Trousdale Estates neighborhood on the market for $17.5 million, having owned it for close to a decade.
While he may simply be switching up his L.A. living situation, the sale will no doubt raise some eyebrows, especially after he indicated in an interview with French newspaper Le Figaro earlier this year that the city fails to fill him with the inspiration that it once did.
“I arrived in California in 2008, and I was already very attracted to Los Angeles, where I frequently went since the end of the 1990s. I would start all my Dior collections there, in my hotel room. The city was still asleep, so it was the perfect time to fill in a blank page. There was no creative or artistic stimulation yet, nor was there an emergence of a strong music scene,†he said. “[Los Angeles] has changed today. It’s been taken over and the authenticity is slowly getting lost because the megalopolis appeals to the world and the youth. Los Angeles is an open-air construction site and its mythical places are disappearing day by day.â€
It is understood Celine has facilities in L.A., and a prototype studio and atelier in Paris, where Slimane has been spending a great deal of time this year.
A spokeswoman for Celine declined to comment.
According to the listing, the five-bedroom, six-bathroom house, which set him back a little over $4 million, was designed by British architect Rex Lottery in the Sixties and has been extensively remodeled by Slimane. The renovation yielded a living room with high ceilings, a gourmet chef’s kitchen, a large dining room, an office/media room, and a plush master suite.
The grounds boast a large swimming pool, reflecting ponds, areas for entertaining and many palm trees (some linked with hammocks), according to the listing by agent Kurt Rappaport of Westside Estate Agency.
Slimane isn’t the only fashion designer with a penchant for midcentury modern properties in L.A. In 2016, Tom Ford paid $38.75 million for the late Betsy Bloomingdale’s Holmby Hills home in an off-market deal.
The listing of Slimane’s house was first reported by WWD’s sister publication Variety.
