Castle-inspired home in California on the market for $3.475 million

Take a drive through a quiet subdivision in Alamo, California filled with ranch homes, and follow a private road up to 176 Mountain Canyon Lane. There, you’ll find a castle that’s something to behold. Yes, a castle tucked in a neighborhood that you would never expect a castle to be in. The 4,476-square-foot medieval-inspired home on 2.2 acres is on the market for $3,475,000.

“It’s not your traditional Alamo home,” says listing agent Melissa Fulop of Compass real estate brokerage. Privacy plus amazing mountain and valley views are just the beginning of what makes the Castle of Alamo a majestic estate.

Built in 1988, this enchanting mansion full of grandeur is straight out of a storybook. The three-bedroom, three-bath home was made with numerous reclaimed and repurposed materials, including 120,000 bricks from around the region, ridge beams and rafters reclaimed from a shuttered JCPenney store in San Francisco, roof rafters from an abandoned Army depot in Oakland and stairs created from salvaged church pews.

As you enter the property, flourishing gardens and stone steps lead to the grand custom entry door. The roof is a mixture of copper and slate. Unique roof rafters protruding from under the eaves were hand-carved into eye-catching faces, animals and objects that will make you smile. And there’s something about the turrets that give you that regal feeling, even just for a day.

Once inside, the crafted brickwork immediately catches your eye. The Old World beauty of the masonry lends a timeless appeal. Rugged meets refined in the dining room where the walls are made of hand-hammered copper. What is that gentle trickling sound you hear? An invisible waterfall in the dining room brings the sounds of nature inside, of course. “You can hear the water, but you can’t see it,” says Fulop.

From the dining room, head into the kitchen where you will find a large pantry. The cabinet doors in the kitchen came from a barn in Napa Valley.

“The smooth countertops are made of cured walnut that came from trees that were cut down from a local area in the 1970s,” says Fulop.

A breakfast nook leads to the great room where you notice a 25-foot ceiling and a huge fireplace with a recess so deep that you can almost step inside. A few items in this room also were reclaimed.

“The central chandelier in the great room was retrieved from Fremont High School gymnasium, and the fireplace mantel came from a bar in Jack London Square in Oakland,” says Fulop.

A staircase in the great room leads to a loft area. The banisters consist of heavy steel rods that encircle large antique wine vats, and the hand railings are made from old fence pipe.

In the first loft area, a door leads to a balcony. “You go across a cat walk to another loft studio, which was originally a studio for the original owner’s wife, who was an artist,” explains Fulop. There you will find a unique door, a full confessional door from a church in England.

Between the cozy den and dining room is a hallway that leads to the bedrooms, one of which has a window seat overlooking the garden. Adjacent to that bedroom is a full bathroom with a countertop and bathtub surround made of river rock. Slate radiant-heated floors are throughout the home. Every door was hand-crafted to fit its unique location.

A set of stairs that lead to a small loft area are not your ordinary stairs. “It’s a press ladder that was used to climb up to check newspaper presses. It came from the Oakland Tribune,” explains Fulop.

A deck above the four-car garage is ideal for entertaining and dining with spectacular views of the surrounding natural beauty, including sunrise and sunset vistas of Mount Diablo and the Las Trampas ridgeline. Just imagine what you could tell your friends about where you live.

Click here to watch a video of 176 Mountain Canyon Lane. For more information, contact listing agent Melissa Fulop via email at [email protected] or call 925-788-4178.

This post first appeared on Forbes.com. To see the original, click here.