Can you guess who built this “quaint” teahouse on a piece of their 23,000 square foot property? Here’s a few hints… The home is part of “The Promised Land” and even though its owner stays Making It Rain On Them Hoes the teahouse was built as a place of sanctuary from the California showers.
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The teahouse belongs to none other than Oprah Winfrey. It’s part of her $85 million estate. The media mogul opened her property’s rose garden and teahouse to her homie Nate Berkus for his “House Proud” show earlier this week. We understand why she hasn’t let people in before, because the more she explained her stuff the more “eccentric” she sounds…
“I call this the Promise Land Tree,” says Oprah. “It’s my favorite tree on the property.” A bench-shaped rock serves as a place for Oprah to read, sit and meditate. The Promise Land wasn’t always the Promise Land. Originally the property was ‘Tara Two,’ a nod to the “Tara” Plantation in Scarlett O’Hara’s “Gone with the Wind.” You know that scene when she says, ‘I’ve got to get home to Tara?’ That’s what this place is for me,” says Oprah. “I always feel like no matter what’s going on, I can come here, sit under the tree, and restore myself. ”
Oprah eventually changed the name of her house from Tara Two to The Promise Land:
“One morning I woke up and looked out over the land and the trees and I thought, ‘Scarlett O’Hara wishes she had had this!’” Oprah laughs.
Inspiration for a new name struck during a conversation with Bob Greene, her longtime exterior decorator, who described the land as a “fulfillment of a promise.” The Promised Land fit, and echoed a sentiment shared by one of Oprah’s heroes. “Dr. King said he would not get to the Promised Land, but one day, we might,” she recalls. “I think [this land] is the fulfillment of the promise that Dr. King spoke of.” [insert side-eye]
This is the inside of the tea house. Oprah says when it was being built she graced the workers with her presence: “I would come down and talk to them every day and really let them know that through […] their handiwork that they were blessing this space for me.” By the way, as much as she likes nature, she doesn’t want to hear certain sounds of “nature” so the tea house has no bathroom, but there is an upscale outhouse a short distance away.
Oprah also has forbidden business talk in the teahouse. It’s all zen baby!
Of course the property is so big that you need a golf cart to get around. Maybe if she ditched the golf cart, oh nevermind. Apparently Oprah decided to have a lavender patch put in after visiting Valentino’s lavender gardens. Why not, right?
Oprah also employs a master rosarian to maintain her 600 + rosebushes. Harpo says: “I particularly love roses because they represent, I think, from the Spirit Realm what we really are. They bring the fragrance from the Spirit World. That’s what I believe.”
Oprah is not too shy to stunt either. She says about her land: “I used to dream of having a home with a picket fence and six trees in the backyard. And now I look out into my backyard and there’s not six trees…there’s a couple thousand trees.” [SMH]
“I love being surrounded by the beauty,” Oprah says of gardening. “I love anything in nature, but I particularly love flowers and I particularly love roses, because they represent from the spirit realm what we really are. They come from the same space that we breathe and represent beauty. If you can just sit with a rose, you can feel the stillness and the presence of it, and connect to that, that is yourself. That’s what is meant by ‘stop and smell the roses.'”
Okay here’s where it gets weird… Oprah’s most prized possession is this photo album with pictures of her five dogs. She says if the house was burning down this is what she’d want to make sure she grabbed.
And this is the picture that defines her?
“The house is really all about this,” says Oprah, taking in the teahouse’s magnificent view. “It’s all about the view. Isn’t this spectacular? I LOVE it!”
