Kanye's Krib

OWNER: Kanye West
LOCATION: Fareholm Drive, Los Angeles, CA
PRICE: $1,750,000 (purchased in 2003)
SIZE: 4,214 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 4 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: If Your Mama is being honest, and we always are, we don't like Kanye West as a public personality. It is just our opinion children, but we find the 6 time Grammy winning hip hopper oozes ego in a smarmy and off putting "I'm better than you" sort of way. Then there was that hissy fit at the MTV Music Awards which just made him look like a complete ass. Mister West may in fact be a warm, fuzzy and down to earth guy in person, and we sincerely hope he is. But if Your Mama was his highly paid PR flak we'd be telling the dude to tone it down and put his damn feet back on the ground.

The other day Your Mama discussed Mister West's demolition ready Beverly Hills flats flip property that he recently and boldly dropped onto the market for $8,699,000. Can you remember that far back puppies? Mister West never actually renovated, rebuilt or moved into that dump, so Your Mama got to wondering where the obsessively groomed and perfectly coiffed singer actually beds down at night.

While Your Mama has vast network of tipsters, tattlers and crack researchers, we are not miracle workers. Believe it or not, there are times when Your Mama struggles to locate the current residences of entertainment superstars. For example, with the help of Lucy Spillerguts, Your Mama just located the two adjacent Hidden Hills properties owned by rock 'n roll scion Lisa Marie Presley after several months of on and off hunting. We toiled similarly looking for Kanye's krib in the City of Angels, and came up empty until Mister Big Time filled in our real estate gaps and informed us that Mister Kanye West purchased his kurrent krib on Fareholm Drive in November of 2003 for $1,750,000. He's clearly dumped a lot more money into customizing and renovating the place.

During our (admitedly) not very extensive research on the internetsm, Your Mama did come up with a recent and amazing article from Interior Design magazine via CasaSugar (and another from Harper's Bazaar) about Mister Kanye West's modern, minimal and pop art filled party pad at the foot of the Hollywood Hills overlooking Hollywood Boulevard. The article reveals three things we imagine many people, people including Your Mama, don't likely know about Mister West. He studied fine art at the American Academy of Art in Chicago, he's a fan and collector of pop art, and he's a design diva. Not being much of a fan of Mister West, the article also educated Your Mama to the fact that he is now engaged to his long time fashionista gurlfriend Alexis Phifer. Well look at that. Shows you want Your Mama knows, we didn't even know he liked the ladees.

We have no doubt that Mister West is as meticulous in his housekeeping as he is about his grooming, and the squeaky clean rapper prolly employs a team of good lookin' gurls (or boys) to keep the slick surfaces of his sleek home dust and finger print free. However, when looking at the plush pictures by photographer Art Gray for Interior Design, please keep in mind that a crew of giddy gay stylists scrubbed the place clean of personal effects like shampoo bottles, mobile phones, and stacks of paper so that the place appears as spare as a modern art museum. It's highly unlikely the place looks this uncluttered and un-lived in everyday.

According to the I.D. article, Desiridata Design was hired to do over the place into Mister West's fantasy vision of "a cross between a museum and a Louis Vuitton boutique." And hunnies, it's Louis Vuitton all over the place up in this krib. Not only is there a short stack of custom ordered trunks on display in the entrance hall and a marvelous vintage steamer in the kitchen, there's at least a dozen multi-colored hard sided cases stacked up more than six feet high in the big man's office. There's also a customized Louis Vuitton drum machine, which is just overkill in Your Mama's design book. But then again, what do we know?

Your Mama does not love everything about Mister West's house, but there are several notable features that we would like to point out:

1. The French walnut floors are outta this world. We have goose pimples thinking about how delicious that material must feel on bare feet.
2. The trio of Warhol soup can silk screens? They are the real thing, kids. And they cost a fortune.
3. Generally we are not a fan of Japanese art star Takashi Murakami's kooky work, Your Mama digs the big skull painting in the living room and all those Murakami flower pillows in Mister West's office are whimsically dee-voon.
4. Given half a chance, Your Mama would sneak that hot pink Russell Young silk screen of Marilyn Monroe entertaining the troops out of the house in a big Louis Vuitton bag.
5. That mural that Mister Kanye commissioned for the dining room ceiling? Uhm, no. But fortunately, the iconic Fortuny floor lamp pleasantly distracts from the upsetting ceiling issue.
6. The gor-gee-us travertine clad bathroom has Your Mama's head gleefully spinning around like the devil possessed gurl in The Exorcist and that is by far the most spectacular residential fish tank we have ever seen.
7. Even though it's butt ugly and we don't give a crap what any of the children think about it, Your Mama would pummel the Pope for that limited edition Brothers Campana stuffed animal chair.
8. Your Mama does not care for those wacky Burton Morris paintings of the Jetsons, but the spectacular turquoise Eero Koivisto chair in the game room has us in a cold sweat.
9. Do ya'll notice that despite the lovely lily white walls, this house is filled with bright and pleasing color? Bravo!
10. Lastly, what's not to love about a customized closet where one's multi colored kicks can be lined up like a poor man's Damien Hirst sculpture?

Your Mama is just going to make one recommendation to Mister West about his decorative choices. Dude, you better hire some extra security, because PETA is going to be throwing blood balloons at yer damn house after they see all that red-fox and chinchilla fur stuff on the bed.