The headline on a recent real estate listing located just north of Chastain Park caught my attention: “Discover the legacy of Kenny Rogers as you step inside his final home.” It beckoned, “Now is your time to own a piece of Kenny Rogers’ history.” Interior photos revealed walls lined with platinum records and shelves proudly displaying a row of Grammy Awards. The listing was first reported by The Wall Street Journal and then generated headlines around the world before selling quickly at the $2.475 million asking price.
Rogers’ final home featured his signature design style, including faux old-world European finishes, a muted beige palette, oversized furnishings, and generous touches of gold leaf. While it was more restrained than many of the extravagant estates he had built, renovated, or decorated during his lesser-known second career as an interior decorator, it still reflected his distinctive style.
Opulent Estates and a Decorator’s Touch
Kenny Rogers’ music career was monumental, spanning seven decades and resulting in over 120 million records sold, making him one of the most iconic musical personalities in the world during his time. He was born in Houston and spent much of his early career in Los Angeles, before eventually making Buckhead his home. In the Bel-Air neighborhood of LA, Rogers owned an estate that Realtor.com called the “most prestigious luxury estate” in Bel Air, boasting “possibly the best views in Los Angeles.” He purchased the property in the 1970’s, added large lion statues on either side of the gated entrance, and christened the property “Lionsgate”, as it is still called to this day. Rogers sold the home in 1983 for $5.8 million, but the property most recently traded hands in 2015 for $46.25 million. This exposure to an opulent lifestyle early in his career undoubtedly influenced his future taste in homes and interiors. “I’ve seen some incredible places,” said Rogers. “I think taste is dictated by exposure.”
The Buckhead Connection
Rogers eventually settled in Atlanta, a city that would become intrinsic to his personal and professional life. Atlanta’s vibrant music scene and growing entertainment industry offered both new opportunities and a more tranquil pace of life. Moreover, Rogers was drawn to the city’s Southern charm and burgeoning real estate market.
Rogers soon became a fixture around Buckhead. He met his 5th wife, Wanda Miller, while having dinner at Pricci in the Buckhead Village, where she was a hostess. The two married in 1997 and would spend his final 22 years together in and around Buckhead in various homes with their twin sons.
One of the most recognizable homes that Wanda and Kenny purchased together in Buckhead was not far from where they had met. They paid $2.8 million for an elaborate Italianate home at the corner of Valley Road and Habersham Road. Rogers renovated the home to include a combination of international flavors. He labeled his sense of style as “high-end eclectic” in an interview with the AJC. “I love Chinese. I love Italian. And in almost every house I have had, I have an African Room.”
In 2002, Rogers purchased a six-bedroom, 26,000-square-foot mansion a few miles away on Garmon Road, which had been repossessed by a bank. Originally listed for $12 million with no buyers, the price eventually dropped to $4 million, and Rogers acquired it for $2.75 million. He transformed the property into a striking “French castle,” incorporating themed suites inspired by Asian, Safari, and Mediterranean influences, as well as a Grecian-style pool. In a nod to his former LA digs, larger-than-life stone lions were installed to guard the front gates. The grand entry hall with 40-foot ceilings became a Moroccan-style seating area with floor cushions and fabric-draped columns. One of his new neighbors, former Home Depot CEO Bob Nardelli, introduced Rogers to established interior designer Jim Weinberg to consult on the project.
Rogers and Weinberg quickly developed a strong creative partnership, leading them to co-found an interior design firm called Kenji Design Studios that had a storefront on Huff Road. “We bounce off each other in a melodic way,” Weinberg told Atlanta Magazine in an interview. “My role is to help him to his next level of accomplishment.” Not everyone in the Atlanta design world was welcoming of the new super-star interior designer. “Design in Atlanta is an open market, and many people are doing it. I think it’s great that Kenny Rogers is putting his financial backing behind this. I personally don’t feel the need to be a singer,” commented interior designer Stan Topol to Atlanta Magazine.
Despite this, Kenji and Kenny Rogers continued their winning streak as the market accepted their gilded France-meets-Asia style. Kenji took on a bold speculative renovation project for a 15,000-square-foot residence located at 1080 West Paces Ferry Road. Rogers came up with the idea of a ten-car underground garage, and Home Depot billionaire Arthur Blank purchased the property in 2006. “We think there’s a market that’s untouched, which is CEO territory, and everybody’s afraid of it. But we’re not afraid to play there because we know how to make it work,” Rogers boasted to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
They struck gold again when Donald Trump announced twin condo towers near the High Museum in Midtown in the Season finale of The Apprentice in 2007. Kenji was tapped as the lead interior designer and their Huff Road showroom became the sales office.
Never one to rest on his laurels, in 2015 Rogers told the U.K.’s The Guardian that he had some big retirement plans for an amusement park called Kennyland or Kenny World located “on an island” 40 miles north of Atlanta. It would be like Dollywood, he said, but more high-tech. “We are doing a SXSW theme, where singers and songwriters will want to come here. We have an avatar of me on the stage.”
Know When to Hold ’em, Know When to Fold ’em
Rogers was a hard worker, never satisfied enough with his world-wide fame or incredible wealth to sit still for long. Still, his ventures outside of the music business often faltered. The Trump Tower project in Atlanta that was to be the capstone of his decorating career was never built, and the land was foreclosed in 2010 during The Great Recession. The homes he built and decorated often sat on the market for years waiting for buyers. Design trends moved away from his signature international opulence toward a more modern look with clean lines. His former home on Garmon Road, that he and Wanda had sold for $8.5 million, was later foreclosed.
Kennyland was never built.
Will the Circle Be Unbroken
Though he experienced mixed success in his ventures outside of music, Kenny Rogers left an indelible mark on the music and entertainment world, celebrated not only for his rich voice and iconic hits like “The Gambler,” but also for his charisma and warmth. One of his most touching final performances was a duet with Dolly Parton in 2017 at his final concert in Nashville. Their chemistry lit up the stage as they sang together one last time. Rogers, visibly emotional, called Dolly his “soulmate in music,” as she sang to him;
“How will I sing when you are gone?
‘Cause it won’t sound the same
Who will join in on those harmony parts
When I call your name?”
As they had for most of his seven-decade career, the crowd roared in approval for Rogers as he sang his farewell.
In 2020, Rogers passed away surrounded by his family at his Chastain Park home. True to his instincts for finding the best location, he had purchased a plot in historic Oakland Cemetery where Bobby Jones, Margaret Mitchell, and other famous Atlantans had been laid to rest. His tomb is as unsubtle as you might have expected. Six gleaming black granite columns surround an above-ground casket-shaped tomb. Hovering overhead is a matching ring of granite. His name is inscribed on the outside in tall white letters, and inside the ring are the words “Will the circle be unbroken”… and you just can’t help but sing along to the rest of that verse, just as Kenny Rogers hoped you would:
Will the circle be unbroken
By and by Lord, by and by
There’s a better home awaiting
In the sky Lord, in the sky.
