Italian Renaissance mansion built in 1928 for cotton trader Edgar Perry, now a 54-room Auberge resort where guests describe quiet hallway disturbances and the sense of being watched in empty rooms.
4100 Red River St, Austin, TX 78751
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$$$
Luxury Auberge Resorts Collection property; room rates among the highest in Austin. Restaurant Lutie's and bar open to non-guests with reservation.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Paved walkways, terraced gardens; elevator access within mansion. Some original architectural features (including triangular elevator) preserved.
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1928 · National Register of Historic Places (listed August 8, 2001) · Italian/Mediterranean Renaissance Revival residential architecture · Associated with Edgar 'Commodore' Perry, central figure in Austin's 1920s–1950s development · Former site of Saint Mary's Academy (1944–1972)
Edgar Howard Perry — a cotton merchant who would later be named a Commodore in the Texas Navy by Governor Beauford Jester in 1948 — commissioned the estate in 1928 as a country home for himself and his wife Lutie. The 10-acre property, north of the University of Texas in what is now central Austin, originally featured a main mansion in the Italian/Mediterranean Renaissance Revival style along with guest houses, terraced gardens, a sunken garden, a triangular elevator, and a private bowling alley.
E.H. Perry and a circle of business colleagues were major figures in the development of downtown and suburban Austin from the 1920s through the 1950s. After the Perry era, the estate's main building housed Saint Mary's Academy (a Catholic girls' school) from 1944 to 1972 and a succession of other educational uses through the late 20th century.
The estate was placed on the National Register of Historic Places on August 8, 2001. In the 2010s, owner Clark Lyda began an extensive restoration; the property reopened in 2020 as the Commodore Perry Estate, part of the Auberge Resorts Collection, with five suites in the original mansion and an adjacent inn adding 42 guest rooms and seven terrace suites for a total of 54 keys.
The on-site restaurant, Lutie's, is named for Lutie Perry; the property received two Michelin Keys on September 12, 2024 and four Forbes Travel Guide stars in 2025.
Sources
Ghost City Tours profiles the Commodore Perry Estate as one of Austin's most paranormally compelling properties, noting that 'over the years, guests and staff have reported experiences within the property that are not easily explained — quiet disturbances in hallways, a sense of being watched in empty rooms,' alongside what the operator characterizes as a persistent feeling of being observed in unoccupied spaces. The reports are described as diffuse rather than tied to a single named entity.
Local lore concentrates on the original 1928 features of the property: the terraced gardens, the sunken garden, the original triangular elevator, and the basement bowling alley are the spaces most often cited by visitors and tour narratives as feeling 'occupied' even when empty. Ghost City Tours notes that the estate is not currently a stop on its Austin walking route but remains a frequent topic in the city's haunted-property coverage.
The estate's century-long layered history — 1928 private residence, 1944–1972 Catholic girls' academy, decades of subsequent institutional uses, and 2020 luxury resort reopening — gives the property an unusually deep stack of former occupants, which the lore credits as the source of its atmospheric reports.
Media Appearances
Book one of five mansion suites in the original Italian Renaissance Revival residence or a room in the adjacent inn. The mansion's terraced gardens, triangular elevator, and bowling alley are the locations most often cited in paranormal lore.
Dine at Lutie's, the on-site restaurant named for Lutie Perry, set within the historic estate gardens. Open to non-guests with advance reservation.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
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