You Better Work

Drag legend RuPaul taps longtime friend Martyn Lawrence Bullard to conjure an LA manse worthy of the supermodel of the world

- By Mayer Rus. Photography by Douglas Friedman

Not since Carlos de Beistegui teamed up with Emilio Terryor perhaps not since Auntie Mame joined forces with Yul Uhluhave a client and a decorator been more happily matched than RuPaul Andre Charles and Martyn Lawrence Bullard. RuPaul, of course, is the queen of drag, a revolutionary performer and avatar of glamour recognized around the globe. Bullard, a mainstay of the AD100, is no stranger to enchantment himself-he, too, has built an international reputation based on unapologetic, often outré beauty. When the Drag Race impresario and his husband, rancher Georges LeBar, acquired a Beverly Hills mansion as their new home base in Los Angeles, they naturally called on Bullard, a friend of nearly three decades, to make it pop. "We've always loved Martyn's aesthetic, so we trusted him," RuPaul says. "I said, 'Go for it. I can go as far as your imagination will take us."

And go for it he did. Draping his magician's cloak over a grand but uninspired residence built in the 1980s, Bullard transformed the property into a fever dream of Hollywood Regency style that bridges old-school Beverly Hills swank and the vivacious, larger-than-life spirit of his client. "This is the house of Ru, a mansion of style designed as the center stage for the world's most famous and celebrated drag queen. It's the ultimate runway for the supermodel of the world," the designer raves, adding, "I could not imagine a more appropriate place for the universe's drag mother to hold court."