Smells like luxury: Yankee Candle founder’s property hits the market for $23 million

A “Disneyland-inspired” property featuring 120,000 square feet of living space across eight structures, complete with a bowling alley, golf course, arcade, and four tennis courts, is for sale in Leverett.

And that’s not all. The sprawling estate, which was built and owned by the late Michael J. Kittredge II, the founder of Yankee Candle, also has an indoor water park, two climate-controlled car barns with space for 60 classic cars, and a 4,000-square-foot stage that’s welcomed groups such as Hall & Oates and KC and The Sunshine Band.As the listing site says, “The analogy to a country club cannot be denied.”

Get a whiff of the price tag: $23 million. That’s a lot of scented candles.

Johnny Hatem Jr., a real estate agent with Douglas Elliman, said the 60-acre property at 113 Juggler Meadow Road just hit the market.

“It was inspired by Disney. It’s not just a saying,” Hatem said. “When you walk down the path next to the koi pond, and to the spa and back to the main house, the roads are curved. Everything was designed to make it feel like you’re in a separate world.”

Kittredge’s son, Michael “Mick” Kittredge III, is selling the property because he lives there alone and considers it to be “too much for one person,” Hatem said. Before Kittredge died in 2019, there were always a lot of people on the property because Kittredge was a “hosting machine,” Hatem quipped.

Kittredge bought the original property — a three-bedroom, two-bathroom Colonial-style home — in 1984 for $144,000. He then transformed it into an estate with 16 bedrooms and 13 bathrooms, according to Douglas Elliman.

“It takes a person like Mick’s dad — who was a visionary — to do something like this,” Hatem said.

Kittredge, a South Hadley native, started Yankee Candle after realizing he could make some extra money by melting wax to create candles. He first experimented with the process in 1969, at the age of 16, when he made a candle as a gift for his mother, according to Yankee Candle’s website.

In 1998, he sold the company to an investment firm for a reported $400 million as the business was picking up speed, and today more than 200 million candles are churned out per year.

In addition to its other amenities, the estate has a spa with massage and treatment rooms, a fitness center, a sauna and steam room, and men’s and women’s locker rooms. There’s also a gym with a basketball court and a billiards and game room.

The arcade is two stories high and contains an array of pinball and slot machines, as well as Skee-Ball. After competing with friends in the arcade, prospective buyers can take a dip at the indoor water park, which was inspired by the Bellagio in Las Vegas, Douglas Elliman said.

The 25,000-square-foot main residence, meanwhile, features a commercial-grade kitchen with stainless steel appliances, in addition to two wine cellars, two dining rooms, and a movie theater with 10 seats.

There are also two other private homes on the property that can be used for guests or staff, with three bedrooms and four bedrooms, respectively, according to Douglas Elliman. There are two clay tennis courts, one grass court, and an outdoor pool and deck.

“The buyer pool is large just because there’s a lot of land, so besides a family or an ultra-high net worth person who wants a trophy property, it could be bought up by one of the universities nearby or a corporate business that likes doing retreats for their employees,” Hatem said.

Since word spread about the property this week — including being featured by the Twitter account @ZillowGoneWild — Hatem said his phone hasn’t stopped ringing.

Guess $23 million doesn’t go as far in Western Massachusetts as it used to.

Bailey Allen can be reached at bailey.allen@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @baileyaallen.