Location: Santa Ynez, Calif. Price: $15,900,000 The Skinny: Designed by architect Michael Palladino, a design partner in Richard Meier & Partners Architects, this sprawling modernist mansion occupies a prime hilltop site amid 218 private acres of Santa Barbara wine country. Completed in 2005, the five-bed, five-bath spread is now listed for $15.9M, along with the aforementioned acreage, a separate guest suite, a two-bedroom cottage, a ranch manager’s house, an eight-stall horse barn, and extensive equestrian facilities. Though the current owner’s identity is disguised by a blind trust, the house is said to have been commissioned by Nancy Englander and Harold Williams, both former executives at the J. Paul Getty Trust and he the former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. That the pair picked Meier’s office for their residence shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, considering Williams headed up the team that selected Richard Meier as the architect of the Getty Center.

 

 

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