Wow.

HERE.

It's Thursday, and you know what that means... The New York Times practically writes my post for me. (Thanks, Big T!)

I present to you this Las Vegas treasure in all its glue-gunned glory. You can't really hate this place or these people. PURE LOVE:

Mr. Hart, a singer and composer whose gospel musical, “Sisterella,” counted Michael Jackson among its producers, created all eight bedrooms: the four-poster swags made of bed sheets; the ruched silk ceilings; the gold-leafed armchairs, which he bought 30 years ago for $10 apiece and gold-leafed himself.

“All my family has a black belt in shopping, and we have radar when something is 70 percent off,” Mr. Hart said.

Understood. But why so much?

“I’m just from Texas,” Ms. Hart said. “I like it big.”


And:


On arrival, though, it was clear that informal is something the Harts do not do. A round table had been set in the grand foyer with a printed menu, and red napkins were stuffed into black patent-leather stilettos on each plate. Tiny glass slippers had been hot-glued to the side of wineglasses from the local Dollar Tree store (a precarious gig for the reporter’s slipper, which fell off in her hand). More glass shoes had been glued to a six-foot silver-and-faux-candle candelabra.

Holy shit!

Mr. Hart wrote a song called “Big Hair Gets You Closer to God." I just thought you should know.



More from the article:


Ms. Hart began renting out the house for weddings in the mid-’80s, though she also officiated at Las Vegas chapels. She’s had her share of celebrities but is proud to say she’s always been discreet.

But weddings can be grueling, and disgruntled modern brides, aided by the Internet, vicious. “Totally run-down, tacky fake flowers everywhere, roaches, brought-in food and located in a horrible part of town with no outside ambience,” groused one, under the name travilyaya, on tripadvisor.com, with the heading “Do NOT Do It There.”

That review hurt Ms. Hart horribly — it was “not remotely accurate,” she said. But since she is getting on and is sick of mopping all those floors, she recently put the Hartland Mansion up for sale, for $8.5 million.

Larry, who now runs an events company called Botanica Las Vegas with his partner, Michael Flach, lives in a town house in the suburbs, and Ms. Hart often stays at her condo at the Las Vegas Country Club. The 34-pound bedspread in her grand bedroom at the Hartland Mansion is too heavy for her, she said, and when she does stay there, she sleeps in a workroom littered with bills.

The only family member who still lives at Hartland full time is Garry, in a suite off limits to reporters and reportedly utterly free of pearls.