For the unbeatable price of $1, the village of Vernon Hills will be taking over the historic Cuneo Mansion and Gardens from Loyola University Chicago, turning the page on another chapter of the more-than-century-old building.
Lake County approved an amendment and partial termination of an intergovernmental agreement with Vernon Hills last week. While the mansion sits within Vernon Hills, the county provides water and sewer service.
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Vernon Hills Village Manager Kevin Timony said the village authorized the transfer agreement with Loyola University for the property in October and is going through the “due diligence” process. He expects the village will close on the property in January.
In a statement, Loyola said it was “grateful” to those who had celebrated special events at the mansion and gardens. The property was being used as an event space, including weddings.
“We are confident that the village will continue the thoughtful stewardship of this historic property,” the university said.
Cuneo Mansion, along with its art collection, was gifted to Loyola back in 2009. The $1 transfer is possible because of a 2015 agreement between the school, village and county, which included a provision allowing the move.
But after the transfer, what happens with the historic site is still to be determined, Timony said. The weddings are done, at least for the time being, and Vernon Hills will spend the next year or more studying and garnering community engagement to find what will be the best long-term use of the property.
The mansion and gardens are not landmarked, but while county documents on the agreement mention Vernon Hills would be able to demolish the mansion or pavilion if it chose to, Timony said its “ultimate goal would be to preserve it as best we can.”
“The village certainly recognizes the significance of this property,” he said.
According to county documents, after Loyola acquired the property from the Cuneo Foundation, but before the 2015 agreement, it invested more than $8 million in repairing, maintaining and improving the property. The school has since invested another $1.2 million.
Timony said that work included additions made for its use as an event and wedding space, such as the construction of the pavilion, a banquet room with a capacity in the hundreds, and a commercial kitchen used by caterers.
But it also included improvements to the building’s roof and atrium area, and Timony said there were “still some significant improvements that need to be made.” Original windows will need to be replaced, the rear patio requires repair and there’s the challenge of heating and cooling the main mansion area.
It seems like the costs of maintaining the property were too much for Loyola, and the revenue as an event space too little. According to county documents, the school has consistently operated the property at a loss, with aggregate operating losses hitting nearly $4 million since 2015.
Timony said there had been “informal discussion” about a potential transfer for over a year, but those became more serious in 2025.
The original gift to Loyola included various artworks and artifacts, which are not part of the transfer to Vernon Hills and will remain in the ownership of Loyola. Whether they remain physically at the building or not is to be determined, Timony said.
Historic site
According to one area historian, Cuneo Mansion is a unique glimpse into a long-gone era of the Chicago area and is worth preserving.
Susan Benjamin, owner of Benjamin Historic Certifications and author of several books and essays on Chicagoland residential architecture, gave some historical context.
The house was built between 1914 and 1916, designed by the famous Chicago-based architect Benjamin Marshall of the Marshall and Fox architecture firm. It’s known for the Drake Hotel and the South Shore Cultural Center, among other buildings.
The landscaping was done by Jens Jensen, a Chicago landscaping architect, who designed in the prairie tradition using native plants, Benjamin said.
The Cuneo Mansion is an Italian Renaissance revival, modeled after Italian villas in the countryside, and includes an atrium, a central courtyard surrounded by columns with a second-floor mezzanine that surrounds this interior courtyard.
It was originally built for Samuel Insull, a founder of the General Electric Co., whose empire of electricity — as Benjamin put it — fell apart during the Depression. Insull’s name will be familiar to many Chicago architecture buffs because he also built the Civic Opera House.
The mansion was bought in the late 1930s by John Cuneo Sr. of Cuneo Press, once one of Chicago’s largest printing companies, and was gifted to Loyola around 2009.
It was originally a country house, Benjamin said. Today, examples of “gentlemen’s estates” can be seen in Lake Forest, Highland Park and Glencoe, but they used to be much more prevalent across Lake County.
“There aren’t a whole lot of those left that are as intact as this particular home,” she said. “It makes it significant and important to preserve.”
The area has changed drastically since its original construction, and today it sits surrounded by suburban sprawl, Benjamin said. She talked about its important historical and architectural value.
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“It’s a glimpse into the past way these moneyed, successful businessmen, Chicago’s Gilded Age entrepreneurs, lived,” Benjamin said. “It’s intact in the way that few houses from that period are.”
She is “delighted” that Vernon Hills is buying it, and hopes it can be opened as a house museum while maintaining the interior architectural characteristics and decorative contents. The surrounding landscape is also important, she said.
Various community-oriented uses could help bring in income, but she emphasized the need to balance that with its preservation. She hopes for it to be “publicly accessible, but in a low-impact way.” The challenge is now Vernon Hills’, as the custodian.
“You’re not just preserving it for a handful of people,” Benjamin said. “You’re … showcasing the way people lived at a point in time.”