After attempting to transform the Wedding Cake House into an inn and events venue, the owners of the historic home have put it on the market, and Instagram rejoiced.
The Wedding Cake House in Kennebunk, Maine hit the market for $2.65 million at the end of March, listed by Nathan McCabe at Pack Maynard & Associates.
Not long after, it made the ranks of other real estate lovers’ favorites on the Instagram account Zillow Gone Wild.
“There are so many cool pics of this it was hard to choose just 10!” the post reads. Thankfully, we have more space than the Instagram carousel. Here is what to know about the iconic Maine home:
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From ‘cottagecore’ to ‘weddingcakecore’
Zillow Gone Wild fans gushed over the yellow and white house with ornate trim.
“Oooof literal cottagecore,” the top comment reads, referring to the social media term for cozy, wholesome domestic vibes (or as Reddit describes it, “your grandma, but like, hip.”)
Someone else took it a step further, with the comment “weddingcakecore.”
Others commented on the price, saying it must be relatively low because it is located in Maine. The home is located in York County, where the median home sales price is $428,640, according to previous USA TODAY reporting.
Owners tried to turn home into inn and event space
Owners Hunt and Katie Edwards spent much of 2023 seeing their proposal to transform the place into an inn and venue through the town’s planning process. The project received pushback from neighbors as well as the Select Board.
One of the sources of pushback was a newly formed group called The Friends of the Wedding Cake House. The group hired an attorney, who attended public meetings and pressed the argument that an inn and venue at the site would generate too much noise, traffic, and safety concerns. They also said it would set a precedent for other private properties on Summer Street to turn commercial and would drastically alter the character of the neighborhood.
Edwards told the Planning Board they had spent hundreds of thousands of dollars restoring the Wedding Cake House and its property. He said he and his wife were seeking to establish an inn and venue to create a revenue stream to help them finish their renovations – specifically, the structure’s distinct trim and columns.
In January, the Select Board held off moving the project forward to voters. The couple decided to sell. “It’s a family decision that we made,” Edwards said.
Wedding Cake House on the market for $2.65M
The eight-bedroom, seven-bathroom home sits on 2.23 acres and has more than 300 feet of frontage along the Kennebunk River, according to the online listing.
Built in 1825, the Wedding Cake House is among the most photographed properties in the state of Maine. The home is formally known as the George W. Bourne House and gets its nickname from its wedding cake-like appearance.
According to local legend, Bourne, a sea captain and shipbuilder, had the house built to “atone for having not taken his bride, Jane, on a proper honeymoon.”
Contributing: Sara Chernikoff, Ramon Padilla
McLOUD — A popular camp for people with special needs was displaced from its longtime home at St. Gregory’s University, then shuttered through long stretches of the COVID-19 pandemic.
But, the beloved monk and Catholic priest who started the program never lost hope, and now his Camp Benedictine is experiencing a rebirth of sorts in its new, spacious home.
“We prayed to God, and I’m just thrilled,” the Rev. Paul Zahler said.
Despite the litany of setbacks, Zahler, 89, is watching the camp come to life again on a former church campground in McLoud. His determination, along with the work of a small but resilient staff, numerous volunteers and generous donors, helped get the program moved to a place where it can thrive.
Oklahoma businessman and philanthropist Gene Rainbolt is one of the people who jumped in to help. He said he learned about Zahler’s programs for people with special needs when he lived in Shawnee for more than two decades, beginning in 1966.
“Father Paul had an equine program and a swimming program on St. Gregory’s campus so I knew about this all these years,” said Rainbolt, who currently lives in Oklahoma City. “They do remarkable work with children that really need help.”
Amit Gumman, a Camp Benedictine board member, said it has been wonderful to welcome back longtime campers while introducing the program to newcomers.
“You hear a lot of laughter here and there’s a lot of joy,” he said. “We’ve had a lot of struggles and challenges, but we made it. It’s kind of divine intervention.”
‘It’s just been a blessing’
Zahler, a Minnesota native, moved to Shawnee in 1950 to attend (now defunct) St. Gregory’s High School. Shawnee’s St. Gregory’s Abbey and St. Gregory’s University, were both founded by Benedictine monks, and Zahler knew he had arrived at a place where he could play high school and collegiate sports while also pursuing his priestly vocation. He became a Benedictine monk at St. Gregory’s Abbey in 1956, and he remains a part of the monastic community. He was ordained as a priest in 1962.
Zahler founded the nonprofit National Institute on Developmental Delays (NIDD) at St. Gregory’s in the 1960s, and Camp Benedictine was started in 1972.
He said he was swimming in the university pool when he realized that it would be a good place to work with people with developmental delays. He started working with children at the university’s child development center, which opened in 1976, and with the inception of Camp Benedictine, he expanded his holistic approach to helping people from ages 8 to 80 with special needs. Zahler said the camp became a year-round camp offered one weekend a month in the 1990s. The nonprofit Home Integration eventually became an umbrella organization for Zahler’s programming.
When St. Gregory’s closed in 2017, Zahler and the camp’s loyal staff and volunteers packed up and moved items used for the child development program and Camp Benedictine.
Virginia Reeves serves as the program’s longtime administrative director and camp co-director with her daughter, Marcy Reeves. She said they found office space in Shawnee, and were able to relocate from St. Gregory’s to a Christian children’s camp in Pink, which served as a much-needed temporary location for some programming. But everyone involved with Camp Benedictine knew that its specific needs and special clientele meant a more permanent home had to be found.
They found what they were looking for in the 40-acre former church campground in McLoud. Reeves and other Camp Benedictine leaders said the location is large enough to host retreats for campers with special needs, and there is plenty of room for Zahler’s vision of a swimming pool, basketball court and volleyball court. She said the camp’s leaders also hope to eventually use a horse barn at the back of the property to restart the popular equine program, all when more funds are raised.
Reeves said a building that once housed a camp concession stand was transformed into a nurse’s station for the camp nurse. Two newly constructed buildings include a Camp Benedictine retreat center for campers and a multipurpose building for meals and other indoor activities.
Camp Benedictine is listed in the Oklahoma Rehabilitation Services’ Disability Resource Guide, a comprehensive listing of more than 2,500 disability and social services programs, said Jody Harlan, a department spokeswoman. Reeves said parents and caregivers of people with special needs have been calling on a regular basis to ask when the year-round camp weekends would be starting again, and it’s been exciting to tell them that the program has returned.
“It’s just been a blessing,” Reeves said at the recent spring camp. “We have 32 (campers) here today, and we’ve been trying to get the word out now that we’ve started again.”
Jose Muprappallil and Mohan Chandran are also longtime leaders and supporters of Home Integration and Camp Benedictine. Muprappallil said the nonprofit was grateful to Garcia Construction and the city of McLoud for their graciousness toward the camp organization. Chandran said it’s important to note that the nonprofit launched by Zahler provides recreation for campers but ultimately helps teach them skills to help enhance their lives and, for some, gain employment.
‘Father Paul’s kids’
Activities during the recent camp weekend included St. Patrick’s Day arts and crafts, a take-home planter box project, outdoor games and whimsical “leprechaun hunt.” The group also made cards for a camper who missed the weekend event due to illness.
Zahler spoke to campers and volunteers as he walked around the multipurpose building before lunch was served. He beamed with pride as several campers hugged him and talked to him about their crafts and camp activities. Zahler said about 40,000 people have participated in Camp Benedictine over the years.
“They’re my family,” he said.
Longtime Camp Benedictine volunteer Kathi Yeager spread cheer, talking with several campers whom she called out by name. She said many of them had been part of the program for many years, spanning from childhood to adulthood.
One of them was Russell M. who started coming to the camp weekend retreats when he was about 8 years old. Yeager said he is currently in his 40s.
“They light up like Santa Claus is here when he comes into the room,” she said of Zahler.
She said she started volunteering for the camp while she was a child psychology major at St. Gregory’s in the late 1980s and she took one of Zahler’s classes.
Yeager said the camp is great because campers love it and parent and caregivers may go and have a time of respite and they don’t worry because their loved ones are in good hands.
“It’s kind of mind-boggling that this little camp that started in a corner of the gym at St. Greg’s is still going on,” she said.
“It’s all because of Father Paul, the power of his vision, prayer and the passion of the people who are here today.”
To learn more
The next Camp Benedictine weekend is April 19-21. For information about Camp Benedictine and the National Institute on Developmental Delays, go to https://nidd.us/programs/camp.
A London home that formerly belonged to Freddie Mercury hit the market for more than £30 million (approximately $38 million).
Listed by Knight Frank, the home known as the Garden Lodge was bought by the Queen rock star in 1980, according to a Monday press release.
He left the house and all its possessions to friend Mary Austin when he died in 1991.
In 2023, Austin announced she was moving on from her role as keeper of his belongings. Later that year Sotheby’s hosted the “Freddie Mercury: A World of His Own,” auction, selling his possessions including the piano he used to write “Bohemian Rhapsody”, which sold for more than $2 million.
Now, it is time to sell his former home itself.
“This house has been the most glorious memory box, because it has such love and warmth in every room,” Austin said, according to the release. “Now that it is empty, I’m transported back to the first time we viewed it. Ever since Freddie and I stepped through the fabled green door, it has been a place of peace, a true artist’s house, and now is the time to entrust that sense of peace to the next person.”
A private island:Pumpkin Key off the Florida Keys for sale at $75 million: It includes multiple houses
Primary bedroom, dressing room like a ‘stage set’
The home was built in Neo-Georgian style in 1907, and Mercury commissioned interior architect Robin Moore Ede to redesign the home to fit his unique style.
Knight Frank says the property “offers grand proportions yet a comfortable homely feel.” It includes a two-floor drawing room with grand windows where he kept his piano, an intimate dining room painted his favorite color and a garden secluded from the busy city streets.
Upstairs, the principal suite is accessible through a dressing room mirrored from floor to ceiling, which Knight Frank said is “in itself a stage set.”
“With huge enthusiasm for entertaining his close circle of friends, Freddie designed the house to be a memorable, inviting place that reflected his vibrant personality and eclectic vision,” the release states.
Contributing: Associated Press
A 26-acre private island know as Pumpkin Key is on the market for $75 million.
The listing managed by Liz Hogan of Compass offers combo deal including a mainland home in Key Largo and the entire island with multiple amenities for convenient management of the estate.
“There are two ways this will sell,” Hogan told USA TODAY in an interview. “Either it will go for a family looking for a family compound and a legacy property or a developer will buy it to build on the island and sell the parts.”
The estate’s current owner, a family from the Midwest, has used it as a family compound but its generations are growing out of it, Hogan said.
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Listing includes mainland home with dock, 4-minute boat ride to island
The mainland home as part of the listing is on the Key Largo coast closest to Pumpkin Key, and includes a dock that stretches more than 100 feet long to be able to boat quickly between the mainland and the island.
The home is also part of the Ocean Reef Club in Key Largo, which Hogan says is a fully sufficient yearlong resort. It has its own airport for private jets, a member-only hotel, another marina and two 18-hole golf courses.
If a buyer wants to give up that house, the island has its own 23-slip marina capable of accommodating a mega-yacht and tennis courts that convert into a helicopter pad for the brief jet to Miami.
Private island listing comes with 2 homes, 3 apartments and office
The listing comes with:
- A mainland house with four bedrooms, three bathrooms and a 140-foot dock
- A ranch-style house on the island with three bedrooms, four-and-a-half bathrooms and a pool
- Three apartments spread across two structures on the island, ranging from studio to two-bedrooms. The current owners have used these to house caretakers
- A 23-slip marina on the island with a dock office and master quarters
Each structure on the island has fiber optic cable, water and electricity. The 11 undeveloped lots on the island have the infrastructure ready for building as well.
Hogan said an acre-lot on the mainland sold for $24.5 million recently.
A compound in Naples, Florida has hit the market for a whopping $295 million, reportedly the most expensive house on the market in America.
The Wall Street Journal first reported that the 9-acre gated compound in the Port Royal neighborhood with three houses and a private yacht-basin would shatter home sale records for the state if the owners get the asking price.
Though Naples Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Network, reported there are other pricy plots for sale in the area that could match it once the ink is dry.
The property known as Gordon Pointe has been growing under the ownership of the John “Jack” F. Donahue, a well-known Naples philanthropist, and his family since the 1980s. It is listed by the Coldwell Banker Realty’s Dawn McKenna Group, in partnership with The Leighton Candler Team of Corcoran and Rory McMullen of Savills.
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Gordon Pointe: 9 acres, 3 houses, 1 yacht basin
Known as Gordon Pointe, the gated compound stretches a little over 9 acres. It includes about 708 feet of beachfront and Gulf of Mexico views, 952 feet of bay views, an “exclusive and extremely rare” yacht basin, measuring 231 feet, and a T-shaped dock for up to six boats.
There is not just one, but three houses on the property, built over time. There is also the potential to redevelop the site, with a larger family compound, or with a “subdivided community for a lucky few,” with at least six houses, according to the selling agents.
Home of Donahue’s more than 80 grandchildren
The property is owned by the Donahue family. A well-known Naples philanthropist, John “Jack” F. Donahue made his fortune running Pittsburgh-based Federated Investors, which he co-founded in 1955. He died in 2017, and his wife Rhodora died about five years later, in 2022. High school sweethearts, they started amassing the land in the 1980s, which is now in the hands of their many heirs. They had 13 children, and more than 80 grandchildren.
In 2017, the Donahue family made headlines when they began exploring the sale of 70 acres of beachfront property on Gordon Pointe and nearby Keewaydin Island, sending out a 62-page confidential offering memo to prospects worldwide. The offering was unpriced, and it included only a portion of what the family owned on Gordon Pointe, with Jack and Rhodora still alive and wanting to keep and enjoy two of their residences at the time.
Robert McEwan, one of two CBRE agents marketing that property, said parts of the listing sold for more than $45 million in 2019. Several lots that didn’t go the last time around are part of the new offering, he said.
Asked how long he thought it might take to sell the new listing, based on his own experience, McEwan said: “You never know with uber luxury things. A guy can see an article on it and come down and buy it right away.”
He commented that he wouldn’t be surprised if the eventual sale shatters records in Naples, and elsewhere in the country.
Most expensive listing in lux corner of Naples
Port Royal has long been known as a playground for the rich.
Nearly a year ago, a waterfront estate in the neighborhood came to market for more than $174 million. A price that was unheard of then. It’s still for sale.
The beachfront property, overlooking the Gulf of Mexico, is expansive, stretching more than 8.5 acres, making it a rarity, too.
More of a rarity: Neighboring property is up for sale on both sides, with the potential to carve out an even larger one-of-kind estate on Naples’ highly coveted Gordon Drive. Combined, they would cost $295 million, for more than 15 acres, with 812 linear feet of beach frontage.
Top selling homes in Florida
The most expensive home sold in the area last year fetched $46.8 million – also in Port Royal. The county record home sale price is $62 million, set in 2022.
On Florida’s other coast, a home sold for $173 million in 2022, which Palm Beach Daily News reported is a record high for the state. It was reportedly bought by software billionaire Larry Ellison of Oracle Corp.
A couple of other heavy hitter sales tailed behind it, like the $155 million sale for Rush Limbaugh’s compound, and the off-market deal for another Palm Beach County that came in at $170 million around the same time.
Contributing: Kimberly Miller and Darrell Hofheinz, USA TODAY Network