Versace's former Miami Beach mansion up for auction
Snake-haired, golden Medusa heads still glint from the gates, the swimming pool and flower pots at 1116 Ocean Drive, vestiges of the glamor fashion designer Gianni Versace brought to South Beach, Fla., before his death on his own front steps.
Though the Versace family hasn't owned the oceanfront mansion since 2000, auctioneers hope the Italian designer's legacy will attract bidders to the Miami Beach property when it goes up for auction Sept. 17.
Serious inquiries only, please. The minimum bid is set for $25 million. To even see the property, potential buyers must sign a confidentiality agreement and prove they have the money to close a deal.
Each room has been uniquely furnished by the current owner, and the furniture comes with the sale, including beds so large they need custom-made sheets.
Half a dozen buyers have expressed interest since the auction was announced last week, said Lamar Fisher, president and CEO of Fisher Auction Company. "They range from very, very high-profile individuals and celebrities to international buyers from the Russian market to the South American market," Fisher said.
It's been officially named Casa Casuarina for more than a decade, but the property still commonly referred to as "the Versace mansion" was initially listed for sale at $125 million last year. The asking price dropped to $100 million and then last month to $75 million.
Casa Casuarina operated as a private club and then as a boutique hotel until earlier this year. A bankruptcy court appointed Fisher Auction Company to put the property up for auction.
Versace and an entourage of celebrity friends that included Madonna, Cher and Elton John helped revive South Beach in the 1990s from a retirement community known as "God's waiting room" to the pulsating, almost-anything-goes party hub that attracts tourists today.
The designer bought a neglected three-story, Mediterranean-style home, originally built in 1930 by Standard Oil heir Alden Freeman, and a dilapidated hotel next door in 1992 and spent $33 million on renovations. The 23,000-square-foot mansion now has 10 bedrooms, 11 bathrooms, a 54-foot-long mosaic pool lined with 24-karat gold tiles and an open-air courtyard. Panoramic views of the ocean can be seen from a rooftop observatory
Versace was fatally shot on the mansion's stone front steps in 1997 by serial killer Andrew Cunanan, who later shot himself as a police search closed in on him. No one inside the mansion's gates Tuesday wanted to talk about Versace's death, except to point out that he was slain outside its doors.
Versace's death wasn't the mansion's only link to scandal. High-profile attorney Scott Rothstein owned a share in the mansion after its 2000 sale, until federal agents seized it among his other assets in their investigation into a massive Ponzi scheme. Rothstein is now serving a 50-year prison sentence.