John Travolta's Family Homes in Photos — From the House Kelly Preston Decorated to His Private 'Airport' Estate

John Travolta's family homes have included sprawling rooms, oceanfront land, and unusual features, but two properties tell a particularly personal story.

One was transformed by Travolta and his late wife, Kelly Preston, during an intense decorating marathon. Years later, it went on the market following her death.

Another took an idea most homeowners could never accommodate and built an entire family residence around it. The photographs show just how far Travolta took that idea.

The Maine House Travolta and Preston Transformed

Travolta and Preston were newlyweds and expecting their first child, Jett, when they bought their home on Islesboro, an island off the Maine coast, in 1991. The couple discovered the property after visiting actress Kirstie Alley, who had a home on the island.

Travolta had been searching for somewhere large enough to bring together his extended family. According to a 1999 Architectural Digest feature, the house was built in 1903 by architects Peabody and Stearns for a member of a prominent banking family.

Its Shingle Style design included Tudor Revival elements. The property offered the scale Travolta had been seeking. At the time of the "Architectural Digest" feature, it was described as having 22 bedrooms and 42 rooms.

Travolta recalled that Alley had shown him other large homes before finally taking him to this one. When he saw it, he called it a "fairy-tale house." Preston reached her own decision quickly when Travolta later brought her to see the property.

She said that as soon as they drove beneath the natural tunnel of trees over the driveway, she knew they had found the place. Yet the interiors they inherited were far removed from what the couple eventually created.

Preston described the original house as "Almost spooky" and said she and Travolta changed the carpets and furniture, using cream and eggshell throughout. "If you need to do it quickly," she said with a laugh, "go white." They had a deadline.

After closing on the house in September, Travolta and Preston invited 55 relatives to spend Christmas there. That meant turning a century-old property into a working family home within a matter of months.

The kitchen had to be redone, and the couple installed a hotel-size furnace system. They also gutted the attic and turned it into a children's area with a stage, schoolroom, playroom, and themed bedrooms.

Those spaces included a Princess Room, an Airplane Room, and a Peter Pan Room. The house already contained English antiques, and Travolta said about 30 percent of them were refurbished and retained. Everything else required a far more hands-on search.

He and Preston went shopping in New York and Boston during what Travolta called a "sixty-day marathon." During the work, they stayed in a small farmhouse on the property that was heated by a pot-bellied stove.

Preston's account of one decorating session showed how directly involved they were. "We did everything, just the two of us," she said. "One time we flew in for a day with thirty fabric swatches that Johnny and I had numbered."

She continued, "There was no electricity, the sun was going down, and there we were, looking at all the furniture we'd bought piled in the living room, saying, 'What do you think about the couch? How about number three? And four, no, maybe sixteen for those two chairs.' Everything had to be decided before it got dark. It was madness—but so much fun."

Travolta said the schedule sometimes left them sleeping only three hours a night. He recalled still walking around at 4 a.m. because he wanted to hang another picture before bed. By Christmas week, the work was still going.

Travolta recalled that as their relatives' headlights appeared through the snow, he and Preston were lighting fires and making last-minute adjustments. Then they opened the door and greeted everyone as though they had simply been waiting for their guests. The original makeover was only the beginning.

Preston's Role Went Beyond That First Makeover

Travolta later said the project revealed an interest of Preston's that he had not fully known about before: decorating and design.

The couple eventually moved away from the predominantly white interiors and worked with designer Christopher B. Boshears, who sought to give the property the character of an English country house.

Boshears combined linen draperies, damasks, velvet upholstery, antiques, and other furnishings. The aim was to make an enormous property work whether Travolta and Preston were there alone or entertaining dozens of people.

Preston said they wanted the home to feel comfortable and warm rather than overwhelmingly large. The couple remained involved in the process.

Preston said they gave Boshears photographs from books, fabrics, and examples of tables they liked, allowing him to develop those ideas throughout the house.

Travolta also credited his wife with a particular skill for holiday decorating. He said she took over that side of their homes, especially for the Fourth of July and Christmas.

According to the 1999 feature, Preston could spend nine days on the Christmas decorations, with a tree in each room. Travolta handled his own areas of particular interest, including airplanes, cars, and machinery. For shared spaces, he said they negotiated.

Preston, meanwhile, described her husband as having a strong sense of style and space. She said they both brought firm ideas to their projects but would compromise and continue working until they agreed on the result.

The photos of the Maine property preserve a look at the large family retreat they spent years shaping. Its story changed dramatically in the years that followed.

The Home Went Up for Sale After Kelly's Death

Preston died in July 2020 at age 57 following a two-year battle with breast cancer. In February 2021, Travolta listed the Islesboro estate for $5 million. At that point, the property was described as a 10,830-square-foot home with 20 bedrooms on 48 oceanfront acres.

The house's real estate listing offered another look at the property that Travolta and Preston had first tackled as newlyweds three decades earlier. By then, the house carried a long family history.

It had been purchased while Preston was pregnant with Jett and redesigned in time for a huge family Christmas. But Maine was only one part of the family's real estate story.

In Florida, Travolta and Preston created something on an entirely different scale — a house where the usual distinction between a driveway and an airport nearly disappeared.

A Family Home Built for Airplanes

Travolta's interest in aviation began long before the Florida property existed. He recalled being 10 years old when he flew into New York's TWA terminal on a Boeing 707 from Chicago.

At 15, he saw Dulles International Airport, another experience that remained part of his account of how aviation became central to his life. As an adult, he became a pilot as well as an actor. In 2002, he qualified as a first officer on the Boeing 747.

The problem was that Travolta did not simply want to fly aircraft. He wanted to keep them at home. The solution was Jumbolair Aviation Estates near Ocala, Florida, a residential fly-in community built around aviation.

Travolta and Preston bought one of its early lots in 2001. The community gave Travolta access to something his plans required: a runway capable of handling a large aircraft.

According to "Architectural Digest", Travolta bought eight acres within a 400-acre property that already had a 7,500-foot runway. He then extended a taxiway to his house and made sure it could support the weight of his Boeing 707.

The result was an 8,900-square-foot concrete-and-glass residence designed around both family life and aircraft. And the planes were not hidden in a distant hangar. They were approximately 100 feet from the house.

Two Jets Became Part of the View

Travolta and Preston wanted the aircraft visible from inside their home. That requirement influenced the design of the bedroom, great room, and dining room.

Large windows meant the family could look out toward the aircraft from several major living spaces. At the time "Architectural Digest" photographed the property, Travolta owned two jets that could sit outside: his 1964 Boeing 707-138B and a Gulfstream II.

The 707 alone measured about 135 feet long, with a tail around 30 feet high. Its scale meant the aircraft outside could stand as tall as the house itself. The residence was designed by architect Dana Smith, while Travolta and Preston contributed detailed ideas and sketches.

Travolta wanted a home influenced by the period between 1952 and 1962, when major hotels and airport terminals helped define the architecture he admired.

The design drew from three distinct sources: Frank Lloyd Wright's clean lines and dark woods, Eero Saarinen's airport architecture, and Morris Lapidus' work on Miami's Fontainebleau Hilton Resort.

Blue-tinted windows became one of the defining features. The bedroom windows reached 18 feet, while those in the dining room reached 15 feet.

A separate 2005 photo tour of the Florida home showed the planes as an unmistakable part of the property. The great room's curved window walls faced the tarmac. A 1967 Alexander Calder work hung above the mantel.

Travolta also designed the floor motif in the entrance hall himself. The property included two plane pavilions, and the taxiway reached directly to the house. Two outdoor walkways provided a route from the aircraft into the residence.

That was no accidental luxury feature. It fulfilled an idea Preston said her husband had talked about for years.

Kelly Explained the Dream Behind It

Preston described exactly what Travolta had wanted from the property. "It was always John's dream to have planes in his front yard—to practically be able to pull up to the house—so that when you wanted to go to dinner, all you'd have to do was step out the door, get on the plane and whisk off," she said.

She further explained, "And we fly in and out a lot. Last year when Johnny was shooting a movie in Tampa, he flew to and from work every day. Each night the kids and I would go out in the golf cart, watch the landing, then bring Johnny to the house while the plane taxied in. It was very exciting."

For this family, then, the runway was not simply a showpiece. Preston's account described the children watching for their father's aircraft and meeting him after work, while the plane continued along the taxiway toward their house.

Travolta had imagined something similar when he was young. He once said he thought that, by the turn of the century, people would have their own planes in their backyards. His own house came unusually close.

The Home Was Still Designed Around Family Life

For all the aviation engineering, Preston also emphasized ordinary family use when discussing the interiors. The house had six bedrooms, while a separate 6,500-square-foot garage contained eight efficiency apartments.

The couple began their interior planning with the kitchen. They ultimately created two: one intended for more serious cooking and another for lighter food preparation. Three dining areas surrounded the kitchens.

The great room included low sofas and Italian chairs, with aqua and chartreuse among the colors used against the blue-tinted glass. The Art Deco dining room moved into a different period.

Its centerpiece was a 15-by-17-foot mural based on an advertisement Travolta had found in a 1937 issue of "Fortune." It showed a well-dressed family waiting for a flight.

Preston said comfort remained important because their children played on the sofa, watched television, and spent time with their parents there. At the time of the 2007 feature, Jett was 11, and Ella was three.

Their mother described the property as a fun house, pointing to its pool, slide, and golf course. The children could even sleep aboard the 707. Travolta said Jett sometimes remained on the plane after flights to watch videos while the crew cleaned.

Ella's first commercial flight, meanwhile, introduced her to a part of air travel that was less familiar at home: tickets. According to Preston, when Barbra Streisand once asked Ella what she wanted to become when she grew up, the child answered that she wanted to be a pilot like her father.

The outside spaces added another recreational element. HELLO! reported that the pool cabana was designed as a "grown-up playroom," with an open area and stone flooring so Travolta could use it for dancing.

A large swimming area, pool slide, and golf course completed the grounds. But none of those amenities changed the feature that made the residence so unusual: this was a family house connected directly to a runway.

The Airport Has an Unusual History of Its Own

The surrounding Jumbolair property had already lived several lives before Travolta arrived. In the 1960s, the land was a roughly 150-hectare horse ranch owned by Muriel Vanderbilt Adams, a horse breeder, socialite, and great-great-granddaughter of railroad and shipping magnate Cornelius Vanderbilt.

Nautilus exercise-equipment inventor Arthur Jones bought the Vanderbilt estate in 1980, including her mansion and about 142 surrounding hectares. Jones developed the property extensively.

He built the paved runway for his Boeing 707 charter aircraft, as well as an approximately 8,240-square-meter warehouse and manufacturing complex and a 400-seat banquet hall. The property even housed African wildlife.

At various points, the compound was home to orphaned elephants, crocodiles, rhinos, and a roughly 270-kilogram gorilla named Mickey. After Jones and his wife, Terri, divorced in 1989, she developed Jumbolair as a residential community for aircraft owners.

It was planned for 38 aviation homes, each designed to have access to the runway system. That arrangement helps explain a comment later left beneath photos of Travolta's home: "His neighbors share the airport. Each has a taxiway to their modest homes front door."

Another commenter simply wrote, "What a beautiful home." A third summed up the spectacle differently: "Wow 🤯 mind blowing! Is it even possible?"

A Runway Big Enough for a 747

The scale extended far beyond Travolta's individual lot. When Jumbolair Aviation Estates was offered for sale in 2019, it carried a $15.5 million asking price and covered more than 220 hectares.

Its paved main runway measured approximately 2.3 kilometers long and was large enough to accommodate aircraft as big as a Boeing 747.

The property also had a separate lighted grass runway, a roughly 715-square-meter mansion once owned by Vanderbilt, an approximately 808-square-meter conference center, and 17 unsold estate lots with runway access.

About 21 lots had already been sold. The main runway itself reportedly cost $10 million to build. It was about 64 meters wide and was said to have been designed around Jones' ambition of accommodating a 747.

Travolta's own 707 was once one of the most recognizable aircraft parked there, carrying Qantas livery. He later donated that aircraft to an Australian aircraft preservation group. Over the years, Travolta also owned a Gulfstream II and had a DC-3 Dakota and Lockheed Constellation.

His 707 had been fitted with bedrooms, a television and recreation room, three dining areas, office space, and crew quarters. Travolta was qualified to fly the 707 himself, with relief pilots accompanying him on long journeys.

Yet even with a runway outside, there was one detail he said he would have changed about the house: the gates. He said he wished he had made them wider because maneuvering through them could be difficult.

Preston pointed out the absurd scale behind that otherwise ordinary homeowner complaint: these were electric gates most people would drive a car through, while her husband was trying to bring in a 707.

The Photos Divided Viewers

Recent social media photographs have continued to draw attention to the property's unusual design. Some viewers focused on its interiors rather than its aviation features.

Beneath another set of images, one person wrote, "His decorator is terrible. To many [sic] conflicting colours and eras." Another commented, "Old. He need [sic] to update."

A third focused on the feature that separates the property from almost any conventional celebrity mansion: "He does not have home, he has a personal AirPort." Viewers responding to a video of the property were similarly struck by its scale.

One commenter wrote, "What a beautiful place to live, I only see places like this in my dreams, which none can take from me 😊." Others called it "The Best Millionaire Mansion Ever" and "The coolest house ever."

One person who said they lived nearby commented, "I live about 10 mins from him, He's such a humble and caring guy. Goes out in public and doesn't mind talking to his fans long as you don't bum rush him."

Those reactions came decades after Travolta and Preston first described a house that combined two parts of their lives: his aviation interests and their family routine. The family's history, however, also includes a property connected to their greatest loss.

The Bahamas Home Where Jett Died

On January 2, 2009, Travolta and Preston's 16-year-old son, Jett, died after suffering a seizure at the family's vacation home on Grand Bahama Island.

Travolta later gave detailed testimony about that morning during a criminal case involving an alleged attempt to extort $25 million from him following his son's death. According to ABC News' account of his 2009 testimony, a nanny awakened Travolta and Preston at around 10:15 a.m.

Travolta testified that another caretaker was performing chest compressions when he came downstairs. He then began providing breathing assistance. "I ran downstairs with my wife to help my son," Travolta testified.

He also told the court that Jett was autistic and had a seizure disorder. According to Travolta, his son experienced seizures every five to 10 days, typically lasting between 45 seconds and one minute, and would usually sleep for 12 hours afterward.

Travolta had previously said Jett had Kawasaki disease, a condition involving inflammation of blood vessels. His courtroom testimony was reported at the time as the first occasion on which he had publicly discussed his son's autism.

The criminal case involved paramedic Tarino Lightbourne and former Bahamas Sen. Pleasant Bridgewater. Authorities alleged that the pair sought $25 million from Travolta and Preston by threatening to release a "refusal to transport" document associated with emergency medical services.

Police said no such document had been signed in the case. Lightbourne was charged with attempted extortion and conspiracy to extort, while Bridgewater was charged with conspiracy to extort. Both pleaded not guilty, and Bridgewater later resigned from office.

The family's Bahamas property can also be seen in footage associated with Old Bahama Bay. Jett's death became one of the defining events in the family's history, long before another loss changed the homes Travolta and Preston had created together.

Preston's Death Left Another Chapter Behind

Preston died 11 years after Jett. By the following year, the enormous Maine property that she and Travolta had rushed to transform before their first family Christmas was on the market.

That house and the Florida aviation estate could hardly look more different. Maine offered an early-20th-century island residence filled with antiques, fabric, traditional rooms, and space for scores of relatives.

Florida paired midcentury-inspired architecture with blue glass, concrete, plane pavilions, and a taxiway engineered for a Boeing 707. Yet Preston was directly involved in both.

In Maine, she and Travolta selected furnishings, numbered fabric samples, worked without electricity, and raced against sunset and an approaching Christmas.

In Florida, she helped plan a home in which the family's rooms looked toward the planes outside, while their children could ride out in a golf cart to meet their father when he landed.

Travolta once said the Florida project took him eight years to get going. Construction itself took two years, while planning stretched across roughly six years on and off. The result was the realization of an idea he had carried since childhood.

For most homeowners, an airport is somewhere they drive to before a trip. At Jumbolair, the "airport" became part of the family home itself — with aircraft close enough to see through the living-room windows and a taxiway leading almost to the front door.