A contemporary mansion in California wine country, newly built on the site of a 2017 wildfire and wrapped in stone cladding, has come to market asking $12 million.
The 14.2-acre estate at the edge of the Sonoma Valley is anchored by a 4,800-square-foot home designed by the Bay Area-based Sean Bailey Designs and completed this year. It features four bedrooms, extensive common areas, cement walls and floor-to-ceiling windows that amplify the valley views.
The owner and developer is Eric McGinty, who lost his own wine country home in the same 2017 wildfire season, when the Sonoma Complex Fires destroyed over 110,000 acres and nearly 7,000 buildings throughout the valley.
While rebuilding his own home, McGinty met Bailey and learned some lessons about ground-up development in Sonoma County that he wanted to apply on a bigger scale. “Then this lot came up for sale,” he said. “We loved the way the lot looked out on the valley and the southern exposure to the pool area.”
The site on Adobo Canyon Road is just down the road from Sugarloaf Ridge State Park and less than 10 minutes from the town of Kenwood by car, giving it both privacy and accessibility.
The 4,800-square-foot home was designed by the Bay Area-based Sean Bailey Designs and completed this year.Paul RollinsIt features four bedrooms, extensive common areas, cement walls and floor-to-ceiling windows that amplify the valley views.Paul Rollins
McGinty bought the property vacant and charred from its longtime owners in 2022 for $780,000, according to property records, and set about building the home he envisioned. The challenge was that its slope, which supplied the views, also meant that there was no level land on which to build a larger home. The previous home had a much smaller footprint so it was able to fit on the flat part of the site.
“To get the layout we wanted we had to do quite a bit of site work, basically knocking the top of the mountain off,” McGinty said. “We had to move a lot of dirt around.”
The work allowed for the current home with its open spaces, dramatic sightlines to the valley, an outdoor pavilion with an infinity-edge pool, spa and summer kitchen, as well as a 700-square-foot detached flex structure that can be used for a gym, studio or workshop, according to information from Christine Krenos and Joseph Zichelle of Douglas Elliman, who plans to list the home this week.
The 14.2-acre property had to be leveled to make way for the home’s footprint.Paul RollinsThere is a layered pool pavilion.Paul Rollins
“I can remember what the vegetation looked like [in 2017] and what it looks like now,” said Krenos, who also lost property that year. “It looked like the charred surface of the moon.”
But not anymore, in the decade since, the vegetation has regrown into lush coverage and you can no longer see the scars. “What’s interesting with Mother Nature; she really does regenerate over time,” she said.
The fires also paved the way for properties like this one—spacious, accessible and full of the newest amenities—a rarity in a region where the limited number of large estates are quickly snapped up by Bay Area tech and venture capital executives looking for an escape from the city, according to Krenos. “The fires cleaned land for us, in a way,” she said. “If the fires hadn’t vacated some of the older properties, we wouldn’t have these new properties.”
The property is located near Kenwood at the top of the Sonoma Valley.Paul RollinsThe views are a big part of the appeal.Paul Rollins
The fires have changed the region in other ways, namely in updated building codes and fire-hardening regulations, which are stricter and more focused on prevention and mitigation.
With that in mind, McGinty and Bailey wrapped the Adobo Canyon house in a non-combustible shell and then clad it with Neolith stone, a firesafe synthetic stone often used for countertops, to give it a second layer of protection. And while nothing is ever 100% fire proof, “[the flames] would have to get through two layers of fireproofing,” McGinty said.
A contemporary mansion in California wine country, newly built on the site of a 2017 wildfire and wrapped in stone cladding, has come to market asking $12 million.Paul Rollins
On top of that, as part of the work to level the site, there are a series of retaining walls that also act as firebreaks if the fire were to come from the south. In fact, three neighboring homes that had built retaining walls while leveling their lots to build larger homes prior to 2017 and were undamaged by the fire, he said.
The property’s location, about 30 minutes from the Kenwood airport, also opens it buyers from other markets like Las Vegas or Los Angeles, who would want to fly in, according to the listing agents. “When you get to the property there’s a sense of seclusion but you’re pretty close to the valley floor,” Zichelel said.
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