Hugh Hefner’s ex-wife has opened up about the part of the Playboy Mansion that she found the most disgusting, and the real answer is even more unsettling than what many people might expect.Crystal Hefner, who started dating the Playboy founder in 2009 before marrying him a few years later, moved into the sprawling estate long before she became his wife. She said her excitement faded as she settled into daily life inside the home and started to notice how neglected it really was.
She later described the mansion as a place filled with dust, mold, and a lingering smell that made her feel sick over time.
Sharing her own memories of the property, Crystal said: “This was a beautiful English Tudor home – and my family is from England – on five acres in the middle of LA.”“But over time, I saw that this place doesn’t really get cleaned that well and there’s mould. It just felt rundown and gross after a while.”
“The whole time the mansion was breaking me down, one way or another. Now it was breaking down my health. The house was literally making me sick.”
“Everything was mouldy and dusty and it was just hoarder central in the mansion.”Crystal wasn’t the only person who felt the mansion’s condition was far from luxurious. Over the years, others close to Hefner have said the home needed major updates and basic upkeep that never seemed to happen.
His former partner Izabella St. James also shared her thoughts, describing the mansion as a place that desperately needed a deep clean and complete redesign.
She continued by describing just how chaotic and mismatched the rooms inside the mansion were: “Each bedroom had mismatched, random pieces of furniture. It was as if someone had gone to a charity shop and bought the basics for each room.”“The mattresses on our beds were disgusting – old, worn and stained. The sheets were past their best, too.”
In the docuseries Secrets of a Playboy, former valet Stefon Tetelbaum shared her own experience working inside the home, explaining that she often had to sterilize sex toys left scattered on the floor.
“I had to put on rubber gloves and pick up the dildos from the floor and put them in a special bucket,” she said.“The maids would take them downstairs, spray them with a steam cleaner to sterilize them and then put them in plastic bags. I would carry them back upstairs and put them back in the headboard.”
A few years after St. James’ memoir came out, more than one hundred people who attended a mansion event developed respiratory issues, leading to suspicion that something inside the home was making people sick.
People have said the Playboy Mansion was in need of an overhaulFrazer Harrison/Getty Images
