Updated at 9:21 a.m., Sunday, March 25, 2007
Big Isle mansion for sale -- if you've got $31.5 million
News Release
Kamuela, Hawai'i – A historic estate located next to the Mauna Kea Beach Resort on the Big Island of Hawai'i is being sold — for the first time.The site is called Wai'ula'ula after a stream that flows through the property. MacArthur & Co./Sotheby's International Realty is offering the 9.76-acre estate for $31.5 million.
In 1963 Lurline Matson Roth dreamed up the estate.
Roth inherited the legendary Matson Navigation Company from her father, giving her ample ability to create her unique vision. Already famous for expanding and improving the famous Filoli estate in San Francisco, Roth was no stranger to grand real estate projects. She bought the Filoli estate in 1937 and donated it to the National Trust for Historic Preservation in 1975, showing her desire to preserve history.
In 1963, the recently widowed Roth set her sights on Laurence Rockefeller's famous Mauna Kea Beach Resort and decided to build an estate that would complement and enhance the resort.
She hired architect Joe Esherick to bring her vision to life. Esherick designed five luxurious suites and a caretaker cottage, inspired by the beautiful landscape and coastline. He built them with tall, spacious ceilings, concrete pillars and koa paneling. The completed estate included 7,105 square feet of living space in the main houses and caretaker cottage, a beautiful, white-sand beach just 10 steps away from the main bedroom, and a close proximity to the resort's golf range and other amenities.
It took five months to build this estate, a short amount of time considering the difficulty of importing large building materials to the island back then.
