Calendars had barely flipped from 2004 to 2005 when Hollywood’s golden couple, “Friends” funny woman Jennifer Aniston and People magazine’s twice-voted Sexiest Man Alive Brad Pitt, announced their separation following a New Years’ vacation in the Caribbean. While rumors of infidelity had dogged Pitt ever since he teamed up with Angelina Jolie to shoot the action-comedy “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” the January prior, the break-up sent shockwaves across the world at large. It was no longer quite so good to be Brad and Jen!
Though the duo remained “committed and caring friends with great love and admiration for one another” (at least according to the formal statement they released to People magazine), things soon turned less than amicable. On March 25, the very day that Aniston filed divorce papers, Brad posed for an extensive W magazine pictorial depicting scenes of an unhappy 1960s-era marriage with Jolie, the very woman purported to be at the crux of the split! It was a shocking move on the actor’s part, one that led the first ex Mrs. Pitt to lament to Vanity Fair, “Is it odd timing? Yeah. But it’s not my life. He makes his choices. He can do – whatever. We’re divorced, and you can see why . . . There’s a sensitivity chip that’s missing.”
Sensitivity chip notwithstanding, the shoot certainly served its purpose, setting fans’ tongues wagging over what W deemed “the biggest off-screen drama of the year” and movie-goers straight to the box office to see “Mrs. and Mrs. Smith,” which quickly became the highest-grossing film for both Pitt and Jolie following its release that June. Seventeen years later, the spread, titled “Domestic Bliss,” remains one of the most talked-about in history!
To capture the 60-page “portfolio,” as it was described on the cover of W’s July 2005 issue, the soon-to-be christened “Brangelina” gathered with photographer Steven Klein at the Kenaston Residence, a low-slung modernist estate situated about 10 miles outside of downtown Palm Springs and far from the prying eyes of Hollywood at 39767 Desert Sun Dr. in Rancho Mirage. (Please remember this is a private home. Do not trespass or bother the residents or the property in any way.)
One of the Coachella Valley’s most famous dwellings, the pad’s pristine mid-century aesthetic proved the perfect backdrop for the shoot, which was set in 1963, Brad’s birth year and, as explained by W, “a time when the last traces of the squeaky-clean Fifties were giving way to something more complicated.”
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Image Credit: Rancho Mirage Listings The striking one-story abode was originally commissioned in 1957 by wealthy rancher/real estate investor Roderick W. Kenaston and his wife, silent film star Billie Dove, as a gift for their son Robert. To design the structure, the couple called upon E. Stewart Williams, the famed local architect also responsible for the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway Mountain Station, the Palm Springs Art Museum and Frank Sinatra’s Twin Palms estate, the latter of which, according to fellow architect Alan Hess, “set a tone for postwar glamour as Hollywood stars continued to move to Palm Springs – to larger homes, often on country clubs, favoring a sleek but warm Modernism rather than cool minimalism.”
Featuring an exterior marked by deep overhangs, corrugated aluminum siding and natural rock walls, with a zig-zagging cement pathway leading to large double orange-hued front doors, the completed product is like a little slice of mid-century heaven.
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Living Room (wider view)
Image Credit: Rancho Mirage Listings The interior, which boasts four bedrooms (including dual owners’ suites) and four baths in 4,780 square feet, is awash with glorious original detailing. Williams designed the property in the Desert Modern style, which, as described by a State of California resource record, “grew out of local architects’ desire to adapt Modern materials, techniques, and floor plans to the unique requirements of desert living.” As such, the pad was built facing north to mitigate the Coachella Valley’s extreme summer temperatures, which can reach the 120s, as well as to take advantage of the more temperate fall and winter weather. Former owner Andrew Mandolene explained to Forbes, “It was positioned on the lot to avoid the sun coming in when it is very hot out. In the wintertime, the way the sun moves, the sun comes in through the living rooms and floods the interior.”
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Image Credit: Rancho Mirage Listings The property’s open U-shaped floor plan is configured around a wraparound pool. Preserved retro living spaces include a formal dining room, a den/media room and a living room with a 17-foot built-in planter and a floating fireplace backed by an indoor/outdoor rock wall. Concrete flooring, floor-to-ceiling glass walls and walnut paneling abound throughout.
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Image Credit: Rancho Mirage Listings The eat-in chef’s kitchen is the most updated room in the house, featuring such modern creature comforts as a central island with a marble top and an appliance suite with pieces made by Gaggenau, Sub-Zero and Fisher & Paykel.
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Image Credit: Rancho Mirage Listings Situated on a sprawling double street-to-street lot boasting 0.56 acres, the home’s grounds are made for entertaining with multiple covered patios, over 50 palm trees, a large spa that sits adjacent to the pool, a grassy expanse and a four-car garage.
Mandolene and his partner purchased the marquee property in 2003 and dedicated two years to restoring it to its 1957 grandeur. According to Forbes, the project, which cost several hundreds of thousands of dollars to complete, included “reclaiming the original walnut walls, replacing the ‘battleship gray’ concrete floor covering with ivory epoxy and repainting the pink and turquoise kitchen walls.” Today, the pad is listed on the Rancho Mirage Register of Historic Places and, incredibly, is the only residence of the five Williams designed in the area that remains fully intact.
The property last hit the market in late 2015 for $2,249,000 and eventually sold in April 2017 for $1,875,000. The place came complete with some built-in income, too, by way of the $50,000 it is said to generate from photoshoots annually! Just a few of the celebrities to have posed on the premises include Madonna, James Blunt and Coldplay. The home’s most famous appearance, though, was in the pages of the July 2005 issue of W magazine.
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Image Credit: Rancho Mirage Listings The “Domestic Bliss” spread made copious use of the Kenaston Residence, with Brad and Angelina creating tableaus of a failing relationship in the dining room, main bedroom, entry, living room and backyard.
Pitt, who served as co-director of the project, was behind its dark theme. W explained, “Sometime last year, Brad Pitt began giving a lot of thought to unhappy marriages. The actor was in Los Angeles filming ‘Mr. and Mrs. Smith.’ While the movie uses domestic ennui as a backdrop for a series of high-style action sequences, Pitt wanted to tell a darker, truer tale, one that explored the ‘unidentifiable malaise’ that so often haunts a seemingly happy couple.” Speaking about what many assumed was his relationship with Aniston, he told the magazine, “You don’t know what’s wrong because the marriage is everything you signed up for.”
Klein also looked to Julius Shulman for inspiration, even going so far as to directly emulate one of the famed architectural photographer’s most legendary shots taken at the Bailey House, aka Case Study House #21, in 1960.
The “Domestic Bliss” shoot took two full days to complete, during which time Angelina, who brought along her then-only child Maddox, and Brad stayed at the Parker Palm Springs – though in separate rooms at opposite ends of the property, as their respective publicists were quick to point out.
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Image Credit: Netflix Despite the fact that 17 years have passed since its publication and its two subjects have since married and split themselves, the W shoot remains so ingrained in the public consciousness that an outfit Angelina donned in it has been featured on not one but two recent Netflix shows! In the season one episode of “Styling Hollywood” titled “All About Eve,” which aired in 2019, stylist Jason Bolden visits the Albright Fashion Library Design Showroom in Los Angeles to look for possible Grammy outfits for his client Eve. While there, owner Irene Albright pulls out a feathered frock which she calls “The Affair Dress,” claiming it was directly responsible for Aniston and Pitt’s divorce.
Angelina wore the smock, described in W as a “Giambattista Valli ostrich feather, silk, velvet and tulle” number, in several of the spread’s photos, along with sky-high Christian Louboutin heels and Harry Winston earrings, while Brad donned an Alexander McQueen wool suit, a DSquared tie and Dior Homme cotton shirt and shoes beside her. Though Jolie looked undeniably stunning in it, by all accounts her affair with Pitt started long before the shoot, so the dress can’t exactly be held responsible for the Brad and Jen break-up – though I’m sure it didn’t help matters.
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Image Credit: Netflix The dress also makes an appearance on the most recent season of “Selling Sunset.” In the episode titled “One Last Hail Mary,” The Oppenheim Group agents Chrishell Stause and Mary Fitzgerald visit the Albright Fashion Library to look for pieces to wear to an upcoming party. While there, Stause takes one look at the diminutive piece and asks, “Is this a . . . dress?” After being informed that it is, in fact, a very famous dress worn by Jolie in W, Chrishell quickly decides against donning it, claiming that anyone who does is “kind of asking for a wardrobe malfunction” – or a full-blown Hollywood affair, apparently!