No Need to Check Your Eyes: The “Palace of Bubbles” Is Real

And on sale, 500-seat auditorium included

August 5, 2016 9:00 am

Overlooking the bay of Cannes and just a short coastal drive from Monte Carlo sits a house — or, rather, compound — on a hill befitting the glorious excess of its surrounds.

Its name: the Palace of Bubbles.

Palais Bulles is the most famous work of Hungarian architect Antti Lovag. He created the concept home for avant-garde fashion designer Pierre Cardin. A champion of experimental work in his own right, Lovag’s aesthetic is often termed playful, spontaneous and radical. Now the iconic home is on the market and ready to host any and all varieties of debauchery you can dream up.

The Palace of Bubbles is about 13k square feet, with enough space and amenities for a small army. There’s a reception room, a 500-seat outdoor auditorium, 10 artist-decorated suites, an elevator, and tons of gardens and pools spread over two acres of land.

The organic cave-like structures are more than just a funky look: they are a protest against angles and straight lines, which Lovag called “an aggression against [human] nature,” an assertion he elaborated on by saying “human beings have confined themselves to cubes full of dead ends and angles that impede our movement and break our harmony.” That explains the spherical and elliptical geometry found all over the site.

At first glance, we didn’t love it. From the outside it looks less like a house and more like a Seussian wasp’s nest. But there is a case to be made for weird architecture: it keeps the skyline fresh and offers distinctive landmarks, which never hurt. It also raises the bar on creative solutions for shaping and reshaping modern cities. Given those considerations, and Lovag’s statements, we softened a bit to his bulbous and fantastical structure.

The site has played host to countless parties, fashion and film shoots over the years.

And now it can be yours through Christie’s.

Price upon request, of course.

Hope you’ve been saving.

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