4 September 2018 |
CoVer StorY
designed and built by mike
Sann, the kitchen showcases
solid koa wood cabinets crafted
of wood from mcCandless
ranch in South Kona. A friend
of rusty’s in lA fabricated
and installed the black granite
counters at a substantial
discount. A coffee prep station
offers the perfect spot to brew
rusty’s 100-percent Kona coffee
he grows on the property.
Kona kama‘‘aina home was designed on a cocktail napkin
usty Stewart recalls back in the late
1960s when his parents fi rst leased
a two-and-a-half-acre property in
what is now Kailua-Kona’s oldest
residential subdivision.
Located in the Pu‘uloa neighborhood overlooking
the panoramic Kona coastline, Rusty’s fourbedroom
lair is one of two homes on the property,
the fi rst one built by his mom Betty in 1971 after
his parents divorced.
“The Bishop Estate lease couldn’t be transferred
in the divorce,” said Rusty. “My mom didn’t want
to walk away from the property, so unbeknownst
to my dad, she met with the Bishop trustees
in Honolulu and talked them into extending
the lease during the divorce. She acquired the
property because my dad thought there was only
six months left on the lease and didn’t want to
bother with it. She outsmarted him.”
Betty got her house plans from Sunset
magazine. She stayed at the Manago Hotel in
Captain Cook for nine months while her friend
Dean Kephart built the home. Although she
intended it to be a vacation home, Betty ended
up renting it to a variety of tenants through the
decades including a pilot known as Red Baron
who fl ew his biplane above Kona. Meanwhile,
Rusty was busy working as an attorney in Agoura
Hills specializing in auto accident cases. “I took
money from insurance companies and gave it
back to people,” he said.