Much like spring cleaning, world-renowned portrait photographer Annie Leibovitz has been spending energy rearranging her real estate portfolio lately. In 2023, Leibovitz listed her inviting Central Park West duplex and early this year she also put her West Village loft up for sale. Now, another property owned by the widely-published artist, who just shot Zendaya for Vogue, has listed in California and it’s giving a glimpse into a completely different part of her life.
Indeed, seeing a someone’s properties tells you lots about them. While Leibovitz has spent ample time in New York City and traveling the world, she always had a soft spot for Bolinas, California. That’s where her expansive property is located just an hour north of San Francisco.
“I’ve spent many holidays with friends in Bolinas. When the children were born we would go together and they would surf and pick up shells and stones along the shore. And I would occasionally look for ‘the place,’” Leibovitz shares on what brought her to buy her coastal farm. “It seemed like my oldest daughter was going to go to college in the Bay Area. Plus, she was always deeply involved in farming and agriculture.”
Known as The Hideaway, the estate that caught the photographer’s interest dates back to the 1800s and boasts seven separate structures. It was owned by Warren Hellman, a billionaire investment banker and a passionate music lover who founded San Fran’s Hardly Strictly Blue Grass music festival, before Leibovitz purchased it in 2019.
For residential purposes, there is a 1920’s single-family home with four bedrooms, a guest house, a caretaker’s cottage, and a converted garage. Nearby, you’ll find a 1930’s barn, a huge banquet hall with a stage, and a large barn still outfitted with Hellman’s famed recording studio. Equestrian enthusiasts, gardeners, musicians, or avid entertainers can all feel right at home here. And, of course, photographers.
The farm’s Americana history as well as its incredible climate for agriculture was inspiring to the famous seller, who shares “There were 65 acres with an old milking barn that Ansel Adams had photographed. It had been used as a gathering place for country and folk music concerts in its day. We planned to partner with a legendary farmer over the hill to bring the place back to its former self as a working and teaching farm.”
With all three of the photographer’s daughters opting to attend college in the Northeast, however, Leibovitz doesn’t get out to The Hideaway much and has thus decided to sell. Perhaps another steward will pick up her ideas for the stunning farm now that it is available for $8.995 million.
Alexander Lurie and Nick Svenson of Compass hold the listing.