Unique MS Coast mansion for sale on Fort Bayou situated to soak up sunrises, sunsets
Ocean Springs attorney Billy Guice bought a waterfront home after Hurricane Katrina as an investment.
The concrete and stucco mansion was only 60% complete, but it was still standing and took on no water, unlike so many waterfront homes on the Mississippi Coast, including his own.
Guice had finished a complete remodel on the waterfront house where he had intended to live just a month before the storm hit. It was destroyed
The mansion is perched above Fort Bayou on 4.4 acres in Ocean Springs. Construction was completed in 2008, just in time for the housing and financial crisis. Since it was not a good time to sell, Guice and his new bride, Gayla, decided to move into the house.
“We absolutely love this house,” Gayla Guice said. The Guices are selling the 6,000-square-foot home so they can focus on other interests. It’s on the market for $2.3 million.
The house has custom touches from top to bottom. But the Guices will most miss the natural light that pours in from windows that fill the east and west walls, oriented to showcase sunrises and sunsets.
House for sale includes custom features
The Guice home soars rather than sprawls. It includes three floors of living space and has an elevator.
Granite flooring from India covers the living areas, while bedroom floors are hardwood. The house has four bedrooms and five full baths, plus a half-bath.
The Guices have expertly blended antiques and mid-Century modern furniture to create inviting spaces that complete the home’s contemporary look. It helped that the couple has the same taste in furniture and enjoys scouring their favorite shops for antiques.
The original owner had wanted to finish the house, which was a shell when Guice bought it, in a traditional style.
“I said, ‘I don’t want anything traditional,’ ” he recalled.
The great room ceiling is 24 feet high, with a gallery running along two sides of the second floor. The great room is large enough to accommodate several sitting areas.
“There’s a place to sit for every mood,” Gayla Guice said.
The kitchen counter tops are stainless steel, with custom white cabinets, an oversized island and a breakfast room with an antique French country table in front of bay windows that overlook the bayou. The dining room has a 14-top granite table.
A downstairs bedroom also overlooks the bayou. The adjoining bathroom with a shower and bathtub is finished in gray granite. Billy Guice’s favorite room is the first-floor library, lined with cushioned bench seating in front of the windows and filled with sunlight.
Waterfront views stunning
All the cabinets in the house are custom-made, as is a staircase with African rosewood steps that curves in front of a bank of bay windows to the second floor. Walnut handrails soften the metal railings on the staircase.
The same railing design is repeated along the galleries and generous balconies overlooking the bayou. The master bedroom with a seating area overlooks the bayou on the second floor. The Guices have a walk-in closet with custom cabinets and master bathroom with an open shower, also finished in granite.
Both Billy and Gayla Guice love to paint. They display their work on wire hangars along the second-floor gallery, which allows them to scrutinize unfinished pieces to see what they might need.
The art hanging throughout the house adds splashes of color to white walls that reflect and enhance the outdoor light.
A spiral staircase climbs to the fourth floor, which has the only carpeted room in the house. It includes one of five fireplaces in the house and opens onto a balcony that is shaded under an awning on one side and open on the other. Gayla Guice likes to do yoga on this balcony.
They see birds of all sorts on the 4.42-acre property skirted by marsh and bayou: pelicans, osprey, eagles, woodpeckers and marsh hens.
The views from the top deck are stunning.
“This is a bird watchers paradise,” Billy Guice said. “You can see miles down Fort Bayou in either direction.”
