The Christmas Vacation Mansion

Mansion-Bel-Aire-2

Last week I did something that I am almost too ashamed to admit to on this forum.  I, Lindsay Blake of iamnotastalker.com, actually spent about two hours searching for a filming location that I – are you sitting down for this – HAD ALREADY FOUND!  LOL LOL LOL I’m not kidding!!!!  I guess I truly am a blonde!  Ever since fellow stalker Owen tracked down the Griswold house from fave movie National Lampoon’s Vacation, I have wanted to find the mansion which stood in for Clark’s boss, Frank Shirley’s, house in the movie’s 1989 sequel Christmas Vacation.  So, last week, I sat down at my computer on a mission to do just that.   But unbeknownst to me, it seems I already had!

 ScreenShot1538

My first stalking step was to pop in my Christmas Vacation  DVD and skip forward to the scene when Cousin Eddie shows up with his RV at Frank Shirley’s Chicago area manison on Christmas Eve night and kidnaps him – an idea he gets after hearing  Clark’s HILARIOUS “last minute gift ideas” rant.  LOL LOL LOL 

ScreenShot1540

Mansion-Bel-Aire-6

ScreenShot1539

Mansion-Bel-Aire-9 

As soon as the mansion came into view on my computer screen I realized that it looked extremely familiar.  My first thought was that it might be located in the Pasadena area and that the reason it looked familiar was because I had driven by it regulary on my way to and from home.  The more I watched the scene, the more I kept thinking to myself, “Man, I KNOW that house!”  I spent the next couple of hours on Google Map’s Street View, looking up and down all the streets I frequent on a regular basis.  I also spent quite a bit of time researching behind-the-scenes information on the movie.  Then, just as I was about to go completely crazy, it hit me!  Not only had I stalked the Christmas Vacation  mansion before, but I had even BLOGGED ABOUT IT!  LOL LOL LOL   What an airhead I am!

[ad]

Mansion-Bel-Aire-10

It turns out that the Christmas Vacation  house is actually the Mansion Bel Aire which I stalked last May while on the hunt for the Fresh Prince of Bel Air  house.  The Mansion Bel Aire was built in 1922 by prominent Glendale area businessman Mattison Boyd Jones and was also used in the Aaron Spelling TV series Flamingo Road.    According to Zillow, the house sits on over one and a half acres and measures a whopping 5,698 square feet!  The mansion is truly amazing to see in person and I highly recommend stalking it – preferably during the month of October, as the owners apparently really do the place up for Halloween.  Mansion Bel Aire has been nominated for a City of Glendale Halloween Spirit Award for several years in a row now.  You can bet I am going to be dragging my fiance out to stalk it once again come October!  🙂  Personally I think they should do the place up for Christmas, too!  Bring in fake snow ala how it looked in Christmas Vacation!  Can you imagine how cool that would have been to see being filmed?!?!

Until next time, Happy Stalking!  🙂

Stalk It: The Christmas Vacation  mansion, aka Mansion Bel Aire,  is located at 727 West Kenneth Road in Glendale.

Mansion Bel Aire

A few weeks ago, while searching for the Fresh Prince of Bel Air house, fellow stalker Kerry told me about a mansion in Glendale that she calls the “Tara House” that she thought might be the home used in Fresh Prince. So, of course I had to run right out to stalk it. It wasn’t the FP home, but I was so happy to have stalked it anyway as it is an absolutely ginormous mansion that I never would have found otherwise. Thanks, Kerry!

According to one of my fave tour books, Bel Aire, as the mansion is called, was built in 1922 by Mattison Boyd Jones, a highly successful Glendale area businessman and politician. It was since named a historic landmark and is frequently used as a filming location, most prominently as the main home in the Aaron Spelling produced TV Series Flamingo Road. Legend has it that the mansion was also used a filming location back in 1938 during the filming of Gone With the Wind, but that claim has never been substantiated.

The house is truly amazing as it looks like it belongs on a large Southern plantation, not on a normal street in Glendale among normal sized homes. The mansion sits far back from the road on what has to be at least 3 acres of sprawling lawns and gardens. I highly recommend stalking this location as it is truly one of a kind! And, it is very stalker friendly as it is not hidden behind tall gates or trees.

Until next time, Happy Stalking! 🙂

Stalk It: “Bel Aire” is located at 727 Kenneth Road in Glendale. After stalking Bel Aire, head over to the new Americana at Brand shopping center located on Brand Boulevard. Just opened this month, it was built by Rick Caruso (no relation to David), the same man who built LA’s celebrated The Grove shopping center.