Rollins Mansion (Des Moines, Iowa) | mansion / manor house / villa

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This elaborate home was blt in 1925-27 by Ralph Rollins, owner of Rollins Hosiery Mills. Rollins was friends w/cosmetics maker Carl Weeks, who built another signature Des Moines home, Salisbury House. Both homes were designed by local architects Byron Boyd & Herbert Moore, & both are on the National Register of Historic Places. According to an official history of the Rollins home, the two Des Moines businessmen "spent a considerable amount of time studying English homes & Tudor architecture." As part of their travel "Mr. Rollins brought back 16th century ship beams & ceiling beams from the Inn where William Shakespeare performed," the history says. Rollins sold the home in 1931 to the estate of Meredith Corp. founder, E.T. Meredith, who had died in 1928. Meredith's daughter, Mildred, & her husband, Fred Bohen, moved into the home in 1939 & owned it until the 1970s when it was sold to Des Moines lawyer Lex Hawkins, who used it as office space. He sold it in 1995 to the Clarke Companies which added 5,300 square feet of contemporary office space but also rented it out for weddings and other events.