“On the door and throughout the house NO SMOKING signs were prominently displayed … even there she clung to the cocoonlike existence she was leading at the Ravenswood. She kept the curtains drawn in the large downstairs sitting room, preferring subdued illumination to the harsh light reflected by the sand and sea. If that meant sacrificing a view of the water, it was a small price to pay. Throughout the entire house she duplicated the gold-and-white-and-cream colour scheme widely associated with her. Present too were the Louis XIV chairs and tables, a white fur rug, numerous favourite paintings and photos of herself and a profusion of mirrors which captured her image with satisfying frequency. There was also a copy of the sculptured nude that graced the piano in her Ravenswood apartment sitting on the baby grand. From the long row of shower stalls, numerous enough to accommodate a football team, to the staircase mural featuring a series of nude gladiators to her upstairs suite with the inevitable mirrored ceiling and satin-covered bed, the house reflected its owner. Mae seldom ventured out into the punishing sunlight, not wishing to dry out and coarsen her pink-and-white complexion. She never considered swimming, but sometimes at night she and [long-term boyfriend Paul Novak] would go wading.”
Was just reading about how Mae West’s palatial 1920s-built Mediterranean-style former beach house in Santa Monica is currently on the market for US $6 million and it reminded me of the passage above from the 1984 biography Mae West: The Lies, the Legends, the Truth by George Eells and Stanley Musgrove. The boudoir of this house was the location for the famous 1964 Diane Arbus photoshoot with West for Show magazine (including this shot with her pet monkey).
