During his heyday, Kanye West’s stated goal was to become ‘one of the biggest real estate developers of all time’, but shocking new photos of his construction empire – including bizarre, futuristic domes – reveal the true extent of his crumbling legacy.
Just four years ago, West purchased sprawling ranches in California and Wyoming, and his shared mega-mansion with ex-wife Kim Kardashian was the envy of LA.
But ever since Ye spiraled out of control, beginning with a series of outlandish antics and erupting into vile antisemitic rants, his billion-dollar career has crumbled.
His world-conquering status as a fashion and music mogul vanished, and his real estate aspirations – including bizarre building developments inspired by Star Wars – have turned to debris.
Stunning new images captured by DailyMail.com reveal the full extent of his property decline, where his ‘Monster Lake’ ranch in Wyoming and his huge California estate have fallen into disrepair. Now, only the bones remain of his once-bold goal to become to real estate ‘what Howard Hughes was to aircraft and Henry Ford to cars’.
From Calabasas, California, to Cody, Wyoming, several real estate holdings owned by disgraced rapper Kanye West have been abandoned – leaving merely the skeletons of what was once a bold goal to become a construction titan to go along with his flatlining career
The Calabasas ranch where his ‘Yecosystems’ dream collapsed
After buying a sprawling ranch in Calabasas, Los Angeles for an estimated $3 million in 2019, West got to work constructing a futuristic dome development that left architects scratching their heads.
The 50-foot ‘Yecosystems’ were structures he hoped would help house LA’s rampant homeless population, while also serving as a backdrop for Sunday Service, the gospel choir performance project he eventually took to Coachella.
West constructed the domes through the architecture branch of his Yeezy label, dubbed Yeezy Home, which he launched in 2018. ‘We’re looking for architects and industrial designers who want to make the world better,’ he said at the time.
In an interview with Forbes a year later, the rapper showed off the early versions of the domes, which he had conceived with a team of designers after being inspired by the fictitious planet of Tatooine from Star Wars.
He planned to build droves of the prefabricated structures as housing for the homeless, and even voiced ideas to sink them into the ground with light filtering through their roofs.
The perplexing rapper believed that he could build entire cities with the pods, and felt his ‘inspired’ plans would allow them to spring up across America.
West became so obsessed with the idea that despite being booked to headline music festival Coachella in 2019, Billboard reported that he pulled out at the last minute because organizers wouldn’t build him his own giant dome in the desert for him to stay in at the event.
The disgraced rapper built the domes, pictured in July 2019, to house the homeless, and he even envisaged constructing entire cities with the Star Wars-inspired lattices
When DailyMail.com visited the sprawling ranch this month, all that was left were the concrete foundations
As recently as October, West still reportedly planned to expand the outlandish communities, believing that ‘Yecosystems’ would become a regular feature of communities across the US.
Despite being dropped from almost all of his collaborations, including lucrative deals with Adidas and Balenciaga, the rapper has forged ahead with his own business plans, filing trademark applications under the Yecosystem name.
Included in the filings were business plans for a home design service, residential buildings and even retail stores, ostensibly intended to supply services to his future tenants.
But not long after he first constructed the domes in California, in September 2019, West fell foul of California’s housing regulations after he failed to get a building permit. After failing to ever obtain once, the domes were set to be torn down – signaling the start of his real estate woes.
West had even claimed that the structures were only temporary, but inspectors suspiciously found he had laid concrete foundations first – which new images from this month show are all that are left after the wooden structures were raised to the ground down for good.
Ye once reportedly believed that the California domes, pictured in August 2019, would spring up across America, and could help solve America’s homeless problems
Neighbors also reportedly complained numerous times about the construction noise, where workers would hammer away at the lattices through the night under his instruction.
Before their demise, photographs of the ‘Yeezy Home’ project showed several of the looming structures huddled together on his dusty Calabasas ranch. But now, almost four years on from their initial construction, the rapper’s domes in California are nowhere to be seen.
His hopes of re-financing their construction have also vanished, as Forbes estimates that his net worth, which was once valued at $2 billion, has disintegrated to a mere $4 million.
And while his futuristic structures have vanished, the rapper has seemingly given up all hope of restoring the Calabasas ranch to its former glory, with March 2023 images revealing his other structures nearby have also fallen into disrepair.
Scattered garbage, torn down paper walls and a disused four-wheel dune buggy are dispersed around the property. Overgrown greenery and unused building materials border the buildings, which are a far cry from the ex-mogul’s lavish former lifestyle.
The site had reportedly been used to host the rapper’s cryptic ‘Donda Academy’ school, which was shrouded in mystery after parents were forced to sign non-disclosure agreements to keep its secrets under wraps.
Several props from the doomed institution, including drums and trikes, had been left at the scene, while shots from the eerie campus nearby from last fall showed no signs of being a bustling hub of education.
Shocking new images revealed West’s Calabasas ranch has been deserted, where scattered trash and a stranded dune buggy are all that are left
The site had also reportedly hosted the rapper’s cryptic ‘Donda Academy’ school, and props from the doomed institution had been left at the scene
Ye’s disheveled properties in California, nearby to his now-collapsed dome structures, are a telling sign of his recent real estate woes
West has constructed several developments in his Calabasas ranch, pictured in July 2019, including using the site to host his religious Sunday Services
The rapper’s abandoned $14m Wyoming ranch
In his trademark bombastic style, West tried another architectural experiment in ‘affordable housing’ after purchasing a sprawling Wyoming ranch, which he snapped up when he reportedly became ‘obsessed’ with the Midwest state several years ago.
Bought for an eye-watering $14 million in 2019, the rapper set about hedging his bets for success in his bizarre contraptions. Over 1,100 miles from his struggling Calabasas estate, West saw Wyoming’s wide-open plains as the perfect setting to stretch his unorthodox real estate aspirations.
Again aiming to erect the outlandish constructions, the rapper mimicked his prototypes in California – except this time appearing to use concrete-like walling instead of the wood and material lattices he tried on the West Coast.
Images from July 2020 showed the ranch to be a bustling hotspot of development, with numerous vehicles on the site while laborers hammered away at the structures.
But now, following the collapse of his fortune and shattered public image, new shots of the ‘Monster Lake Ranch’ show it to be essentially stranded.
While his divorce from Kim Kardashian was stealing headlines and his antics, including strutting through Paris in ‘White Lives Matter’ T-shirts, ruined his legacy, West saw both his career and his real estate plans flatline.
Stunning aerial shots from this month reveal that although his decision to use a hardened surface has left the structures still standing, they have been abandoned under a thick blanket of snow with almost no signs of life for miles around.
Several other buildings which were once surrounded by cars and construction materials are now seemingly deserted, while the grey domes are the standout eyesore among the stunning Wyoming scenery.
Aerial images from the rapper’s Wyoming ranch from July 2020 revealed he was again constructing the mystifying domes on his ‘Monster Lake’ property
Pictured nearly three years ago, Ye’s second attempt at constructing the domes was still a bustling hotspot of development, where numerous vehicles and laborers were seen hammering away at the large structures
In new images from March 2023, West has appeared to build his Wyoming domes out of a concrete-like material, causing the structures to remain standing on the abandoned ranch when DailyMail.com visited the scene
Surrounded by stunning Wyoming scenery, the rapper’s abandoned domes are an eyesore
Despite purchasing the ranch for an eye-watering $14million, West has appeared to have left the property stranded
The domes’ design was inspired by structures on fictional planet Tatooine from the movie series Star Wars
After a thick frost set in over the ‘Monster Lake Ranch’, with the standout dome structures emerging from the snow around seemingly abandoned buildings
West’s marriage to an architect as his plans fall apart
Ye’s empire imploded in dramatic fashion in recent years after he launched into several antisemitic rants, which were the last straw after decades of outlandish behavior and embarrassing meltdowns.
And while his expensive plans clearly fell apart, he ironically flew into a new marriage to an architect, wedding Yeezy’s head of architecture Bianca Censori in January.
Known for his show-stealing conduct through the years, his spiral has worsened since he launched into several offensive rants, including a public social media ban notably fueled by a post vowing to go ‘Death Con 3 on Jewish people’.
Yeezy products have been pulled from shelves, professional athletes associated with his ‘Donda Sports’ label sever ties, and fashion houses such as Balenciaga and Vogue are avoiding their past collaborations with him like the plague.
The decline has been seemingly unending, with one of his more recent tirades seeing him begin raving about the ‘Jewish underground media mafia’.
The woke-slamming rapper has even hinted he may attempt yet another improbable run for president in 2024, boldly hoping to have more success in a campaign for the White House than he has had at using pods to house America’s homeless population.
Now, without a clear route back to reclaiming his former fortune, the skeletons of his real estate empire and one-of-a-kind ‘domes’ may be all that is left of his legacy.
Kanye West, 45, tied the knot with 27-year-old Australian Bianca Censori, pictured, who worked as the head of architecture for his Yeezy brand
Kanye’s real estate woes worsened as his marriage to Kim Kardashian disintegrated. The two had been seen a number of times at his Wyoming ranch, which now appears to be abandoned
