Demolition contractors last week began razing the historic, six-bedroom, 12,280-square-foot Villa Hortensia mansion on 20.5 acres in Lake Geneva, Wis., which sold in October for $17 million — the second-highest amount anyone ever has paid for a home in Lake Geneva.
Built in 1906 and designed by noted architect Howard Van Doren Shaw, the Mediterranean-style mansion, which also has Arts and Crafts details, sold in October to James Conlon, who has homes in St. Charles and Lake Geneva, by sellers Ralph and Sally MacDonald in an off-market deal, according to public records.
Last year, Conlon sold his Elite Manufacturing Technologies company, which makes cabinets, consoles and assemblies for the electronic gaming industry, to a private equity firm for an undisclosed amount. Since that time, Elite, which has locations in Bloomingdale and Glendale Heights, has been renamed Cadrex.
Lake Geneva homebuilder Scott Lowell, who has had a sign in front of the Villa Hortensia property and represents Conlon, told Elite Street that the property’s zoning allows for three dwellings — the mansion, a guesthouse and a garage apartment — and in the future, “there’ll be no more than three residences.” While declining to confirm Conlon’s identity to Elite Street, Lowell said the owner “is thinking of keeping (the estate) as a family compound. There is no plan to develop it as a subdivision.”
Asked why the stucco mansion, which had a red Spanish tile roof and a domed entry hall, wasn’t preserved and renovated, Lowell said that concept “was reviewed by a number of people who wanted to rehab it, but it would have cost three times the cost of a new house, and the new owner doesn’t want to build a new home that big.”
Clearly, the appeal of the Villa Hortensia estate for Conlon was the land itself, which includes 502 feet of level lakefront, two piers and a private boat launch, along with the three-bedroom guesthouse and the garage apartment.
Conlon did not respond to a request for comment.
The estate sits next door to Lake Geneva’s highest-selling mansion in history, which is the 12-bedroom, 14,145-square-foot Glanworth Gardens mansion on 40 acres that Chicago-area billionaire J. Christopher Reyes and his wife, Anne, purchased for $36 million in January 2022 from the estate of the late investment manager Richard Driehuas.
The Villa Hortensia estate had a $129,911 property tax bill in 2022.
Goldsborough is a freelance reporter.
Join our Chicago Dream Homes Facebook group for more luxury listings and real estate news.
