Freddie Mercury's mansion/official website, from the website of the Knight Frank real estate agency
44 years after it was purchased by the eternal rock star, the late Queen frontman Freddie Mercury, his impressive mansion in London is offered for sale for a crazy sum of 30 million pounds (equivalent to about 138.5 million shekels).
The property, located in the prestigious Kensington neighborhood of West London and also known as Garden Lodge, currently belongs to his ex-fiancée, Mary Austin, who inherited it after his death.
"It was a summer day in 1980. Children were playing in the garden. Everything was quiet and peaceful," recalls Mary Austin in a conversation with the Bloomberg news agency.
"Freddy came out and straight up said, 'Tell them to take the house off the market, I'll pay them the amount they want.'
According to her, Mercury was looking for a refuge in London where he could create and work on his music without the media chasing him.
The secluded mansion was just what he was looking for.
After Mercury's death in 1991, Austin inherited the mansion and has lived there ever since.
She recently decided to sell it for 30 million pounds, as mentioned, after a successful auction of Mercury's belongings for more than 50 million pounds, part of which went to Elton John's charity fund to fight AIDS.
"The auction was a great success, and I didn't know how I would feel, but I realized it was time to sell his things," says Austin.
Regarding the sale of the house, Mercury's ex-fiancée states that she now lives there alone after her children have already grown up and left it, and she feels "the need to start a new chapter in life and move on".
How much was sold for the piano on which Mercury composed Bohemian Rhapsody?
The mansion itself has eight bedrooms, and another area that served as Mercury's studio where he created his art.
On the ground floor of the main building there is a large room which the singer called "the Japanese room" through which he could also go out to the garden.
"We knew not to disturb him when he was there," Austin added.
Also, on the floor there is a dining room where Mercury used to have lavish meals.
Mercury himself designed the room and painted the designs on its walls.
"He couldn't get the designer to understand his ideas, so he decided to design the room himself," Austin noted.
The largest room on the ground floor is the guest room which has a parquet floor, yellow walls and a fireplace decorated with stones.
In this room was placed the piano on which Mercury wrote perhaps Queen's most famous song Bohemian Rhapsody, which sold at auction for £1.7 million.
Freddie Mercury of Queen/GettyImages, Dave Hogan
At the end of the room there is a staircase that leads to a bar area on the upper floor, where people could drink and watch from above what was happening in the room where quite a few parties were held.
On the ground floor there is also a kitchen and a large closet for clothes, and a small, discreet room where the deliveries would come to the house, and Mercury's cats would even sleep in it.
On the top floor is the master suite which is divided into four parts.
One of them is a room where Mercury used to get dressed and has floor to ceiling mirrors, which hid the closets where his clothes were stored, including the famous outfits he would wear to perform.
Upstairs there were also two bathrooms, one of which had the initials Mercury (FM) etched into the marble.
To get to the bedroom one of the huge mirrors had to be moved, and one of the exits from the room had a balcony overlooking the garden and the expanses of the Kensington neighborhood.
Mercury was the most famous tenant to live in the mansion, but other artists preceded him.
The property itself was built in 1909 for painter Cecil Ray and his wife Constance Halford.
Later, Peter Wilson, the former chairman of the Sotheby's auction house (who was responsible for selling Mercury's belongings), and the British spy turned art dealer, Thomas Harris, also lived there.
Mercury bought the house from a family member who was very well known in the British banking world.
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