1 of 2
David Kreutz
2 of 2
an intricately carved Indian door bought on eBay
Most of us think of eBay as a great place to buy collectibles, maybe some used sports equipment or budget-friendly wedding favors. But furnishing a house at the click of a mouse? Seemingly impossible. Highly improbable. But not for Dr. Madhavi Kandula.
"I don't think in my wildest dreams I would have thought I'd have been able to furnish a house on eBay," she says.
Known as one of the best and most sought after dermatologists in St. Louis, Kandula single-handedly makes thousands of patients look and feel like a million bucks. It is with this same aesthetic sense, this same determination to cure a patient's problem, this same attention to detail, that she managed to decorate her custom-designed, freshly built, 11,600-square-foot Huntleigh home for way less than you'd ever imagine.
It is so spectacular, visitors don't know where to begin their tour. Watching newcomers at the house conjures images of children on a first visit to Disneyland, darting from the Flying Dumbos to Space Mountain, more and more mesmerized with each magical discovery. Traipsing from the impressive foyer to the enormous kitchen, from the wine cellar to the home gym, from the formal living room to the master bathroom, one gets just as tuckered out as those kids in Anaheim.
You tend to feel somewhat sorry for Tammy, the cleaning lady who really gets her workout tidying up the five bedrooms, family room, hearth room and two playrooms. But she's probably thankful for the laundry rooms put in on both the first and third floors. It's not like Tammy gets to take a load off in the media room and catch up on her soaps on the 15-foot big-screen projection television and home theater system. Good thing there's an elevator. Yep, the elevator in the three-story home can be quite the necessity.
The office right inside the front door houses what just might be the most impressive detail of all. The computer sits here, and this is where Kandula managed to accomplish one of her most amazing feats--decorating the place. Herself.
"I wanted a really spectacular house and I had a limited budget," she says. So she took the ride of her life on the information superhighway. After plenty of research and even an eBay purchase gone bad, she went to work, two years before breaking ground on the home she shares with her husband, anesthesiologist Mitch Platin, and their two sons, 10-year-old Max and 6-year-old Jacob. First, she bought a bathroom sink, retailing at $800, for only $150 on eBay. "I thought, boy this is a piece of cake," says Kandula. She was hooked.
Next came five more sinks, each as unique and beautiful as the first. Faucets, an icemaker and even tile mosaics for the floors soon followed. "Anything you can think of, I've bought it," she says.
She's not exaggerating. Delicate crystal chandeliers purchased on eBay shed light on the 46 antiques she found online. The light is also perfect to show the looks on friends' faces when she guides them along the grand tour. "People are just flabbergasted at the amount of stuff we got on eBay," she says with pride. "They'll literally stand there with their mouths dropped open and just turn around in circles looking at stuff."
Kandula estimates all of her eBay purchases together didn't total more than $100,000.
The story behind the house goes something like this: Kandula was running out of room for her clothing, so rather than build an addition onto their existing house, the Kandula-Platin family decided to build a brand new home. Sounds like a joke, but one look at her fabulous 400-square-foot walk-in closet (her husband's is a "paltry" 120 square feet) and her Gucci, Prada and Louis Vuitton lined up just so, and you realize this eBay addict isn't kidding around. "My patients always say to me, 'Half the fun of coming to your office is seeing what you're wearing.' I get a kick out of that," she says.
Kandula started her love of online shopping by scouting out big-name designer shoes, purses and clothing and finding herself impressed with the huge bargains she snagged on luxury items. "If I have a Chanel jacket on, I got it on eBay for a fraction of what you would pay at Saks or Neiman Marcus," she says.
She says she's an easy fit at a size 2, and she works hard to maintain that petite figure, putting in time on her new Stairmaster ... a purchase, of course, from eBay. She has to stay in shape, not only to fit into her designer wardrobe, but for her family's upcoming ski vacation. "We just bought lift tickets," she says, "on eBay."
