Architectural obsession. California "house of Escher", designed by ghosts

The plot of the mystical thriller "Winchester: A House Built by Spirits" by Australian directors Michael and Peter Spirig, which was released in early 2018, is based on the real story of Sarah Winchester, the heiress of a famous arms company. For 38 years, Sara, whose role was played by the star of the British cinema, Oscar winner Helen Mirren, has been non-stop rebuilding her home.

Historians and biographers still debate who Sarah was: a crazy millionaire or a fanatical but untalented architect. Or is her house a tricky puzzle and an encrypted message in the Rosicrucian tradition?

Sarah Winchester's house before the earthquake of 1906. You can see the 7-story tower, which was then destroyed. Photo source: San Jose History Museum

House number 525 Winchester Boulevard in San Jose, California is as ugly as it is famous. His mysterious story has excited minds and imaginations for a century. In the USA, this building is called the Winchester Mystery House, and thousands of tourists flock to San Jose to look at it.

Young Sarah Winchester, born Sarah Pardy, archival photo, time unknown. Photo source: San Jose History Museum

Born Sarah Pardy, she was a child prodigy. At the age of twelve, she was fluent in Latin, French, Spanish and Italian, composed poems and skillfully played music. She graduated from the only women's department of Yale University, where she studied not only exact and elegant sciences (including architecture), but also philosophy. In particular, historians claim that Sarah was a follower of the Kabbalistic doctrine of Francis Bacon. She met the son of the founder of the Winchester Repeating Arms Company, William Winchester, precisely during her student years. Their only daughter died in infancy, and William himself died of tuberculosis an hour after he entered the inheritance rights.

One of the rare archive photos of Sarah Winchester from the beginning of the 2018th century and Helen Mirren in the role of the owner of the estate in the film "Winchester: A House Built by Spirits", XNUMX.

Thus, in 1881, Sara became the heir to a fortune of 20 million dollars and the holder of a 50% stake in an arms company, which brought her 1000 dollars a day, in short, she was one of the richest women in the world. But the heavy loss and tendency to mysticism became the reasons why this inheritance was spent in a more strange way.

Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

After the death of her husband, Sarah Winchester went on a trip to Europe, and after returning 3 years later, she moved to California, where she settled in San Jose, bought an eight-room house, Llanada Villa, on a 160-acre plot from a local doctor, Robert Caldwell. She hired a team of 20 carpenters and began the process of rebuilding the house, which lasted almost 4 decades until the day of her death.

Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

According to the legend, which the current owners of the house successfully use for marketing, after the death of William, his widow met with the famous Boston medium Adam Koons and participated in a spiritual session. The spirit of the deceased husband allegedly told the widow that she needed to build a house with many rooms, which would be inhabited by the ghosts of those killed from Winchesters produced at the family enterprise. And construction cannot be stopped for a day.

The organ hall, where, according to legend, Sarah communicated with the spirits every midnight. Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

The attic of one of the numerous towers. Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

By 1906, the mansion had expanded to 500 rooms, and the tallest of its towers reached 7 floors. Many of the narrow stairs led to nowhere, tangled corridors turned the building into a labyrinth, windows and doors opened into the walls, fireplaces were not connected to the chimney. Sometimes the doors to newly built and furnished rooms were boarded up and even bricked up. This atmosphere of oppressive chaos is well conveyed in the film, although the decorators failed to reflect the size of the building and the variety of its interiors.

Archival photo - the Winchester house after the devastating earthquake of 1906. Photo source: San Jose History Museum

Still from the film "Winchester: A House Built by Spirits", 2018.

The destruction of the house, which in the film was the result of a rampage of ghosts, in reality was the result of an earthquake that destroyed the 3 upper floors of the tower and damaged several other parts of the building. After the workers dismantled the debris, the construction of the manor continued again, but then the house grew only in width, and the highest outbuilding was only 4 floors. Builders worked around the clock, replacing each other.

Aerial view of the Winchester Mystery House 24.01.2018/XNUMX/XNUMX Photo source: The Mercury News

The master plan of the manor can be called dynamic - every morning Sara discussed new changes with the foreman. According to the legend, at night, during spiritual sessions, the drawings were redrawn by ghosts. And so it continued until September 5, 1922, when Sarah Winchester died of a heart attack. At that time, the newspapers estimated that the construction adventure cost her $5 million (today it is about $70 million). After the movable property was distributed among the relatives, the lawyers transferred the house to the owner, whose name has not yet been disclosed. Sarah Winchester's condition was to keep the house in good condition and turn it into a museum. Today, the Winchester Mystery House is a successful attraction and, having paid $40 for a ticket, anyone can visit it.

Some rooms and halls look quite cheerful. Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

In the house there is a huge amount of items in Tiffany's technique. According to the researchers, mysterious messages are also encrypted in their patterns. Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

In this hall, they collected artifacts from bricked-up rooms. Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

And this is a carpentry workshop, where decorative elements were made from wood. Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

Currently, the house has 160 rooms, 950 doors, 10000 windows, 40 stairs, 52 skylights, 47 fireplaces, 6 kitchens.

It should be noted that the ghosts, or Sara (depending on who you consider the architect), very much welcomed the progress. There are 3 elevators in the building - two hydraulic and one electric. Also, the house, despite its chaotic structure, had water supply and sewage systems. And the carbide lamps were connected to an electric relay and turned on from a centralized control panel.

Many stairs in the house lead "to nowhere". Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

Some flights of stairs are so narrow that they look more like a ramp. Photo source: winchestermysteryhouse.com

Some researchers believe that Sarah Winchester tried to create a house in four dimensions and draw attention to the similarity with Escher's engravings

Not everyone thinks Sarah Winchester is crazy, although it is her image that attracts screenwriters and writers most of all. There are those who believe that the house is a puzzle that has yet to be solved, the same as Chartres Cathedral in France or Roslin Chapel in Scotland. Proponents of this theory emphasize that the building resembles Escher's engravings and all its architectural and design chaos is nothing more than a digital code similar to that used by Freemasons and Rosicrucians. But for the residents of San Jose, the eccentric and mysterious Sarah Winchester is, above all, a philanthropist and philanthropist who provided jobs to the citizens for almost 40 years.

Still from the film "Winchester: A House Built by Spirits", 2018.

Returning to the film "Winchester: A House Built by Spirits", we will add that most of the filming took place in a pavilion in Australia, but both the scenery and the exterior were recreated on the basis of real photographs.