All products featured on Architectural Digest are independently selected by our editors. However, when you buy something through our retail links, we may earn an affiliate commission.Its hard to think of a star with more maximalist tastes than Elton John. The iconic musician and EGOT winner, who is the subject of the 2019 biopic Rocketman and the recently released documentary Elton John: Never Too Late, has long been known for his over-the-top fashion sensibilitiessky-high platform shoes, oversized eyeglasses in every hue, feathers, and glitter are among his signature staples.That more-is-more philosophy is not limited to the stage; John has long been a collector, particularly when it comes to art and home decor. And when Elton John collects, he collects. Case in point: John owns one of the largest private collections of photography in the world, according to Christies. While his interior design style is still bold and eclectic, it has evolved into a considerably refined version over the course of his six-decade career. However, there was a time when the fledgling star quite literally filled his home with everything that caught his fancy. Below, we explore photos of John at home during his everything-goes design era.Photo: Kent Gavin/Mirrorpix/Getty Images1/15A new eraJohn poses with his car collection in front of his newly purchased home in Virginia Water, Surrey, in 1972. It was a meaningful year for the hitmaker. Not only did he buy his first house, but he had his name legally changed from Reginald Kenneth Dwight to Elton Hercules John. In honor of his new middle name, the songwriter named the abode Hercules. Later that year, he released a song by the same name on his album Honky Chteau.Photo: M. Stroud/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images2/1514 Abbots DriveAccording to Johns 2019 autobiography, Me, the brick bungalow pictured in this 1973 snapshot came with three bedrooms, a swimming pool, and a game room loft. The split-level dwelling cost the musician 50,000, or about $62,000 (an estimated $468,000, adjusted for inflation), per biographer Philip Norman.Photo: M. Stroud/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty Images3/15Making a menagerieJohn quickly filled the home with his various collections: art, lamps, onyx eggs, records, eyeglasses, platform shoes, and stuffed animals among them. An interviewer for a 1973 issue of Sounds magazine noted that aside from being eminent focal points, the huge plush toys that he collected were highly functional in helping guests find their way around the jam-packed abode. As the journalist Jerry Gilbert wrote, The lavatory is situated in the pink fluorescent bathroom and to locate the above you make a left turn at the bison and its first on the right after the warthog. The latter features in this photo, which was taken around the same time that the Sounds article was published.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images4/15Music manThe pianist poses at his Hercules home in a photo from 1974, surrounded by his massive record collection. According to Norman, John kept his vinyls organised meticulously into categories and subsections, with neatly written index cards, even now when trips through Tower Records with a shopping trolley might increase it by 300 albums at a time.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images5/15Budding art collectorShortly after moving to Virginia Water, the Rocket Man singer wandered into a local bookstore owned by filmmaker Bryan Forbes, and the two became fast friends. He taught me about art, and I started collecting under his influence, John wrote of the Stepford Wives director. First it was Art Nouveau and Art Deco posters, which were very fashionable in the early 70sRod Stewart collected them toothen surrealist painters like Paul Wunderlich. I began buying Tiffany lamps and Bugatti furniture. This 1974 photo of the artist posing between a pair of stuffed leopards showcases the gallery walls that displayed his homes ever-growing art collection.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images6/15Elton the art patronForbes introduced John to the work of artist Bryan Organ, and the Im Still Standing singer wasted no time in commissioning the painter to make a portrait of him. In the finished work, pictured above the musician here in 1974, John gazes through an open window and wears a shirt printed with a picture of Marilyn Monroe in the style of Andy Warhol. Another painting by Organ hangs to the left, while a suit of armor guards the entrance to the next room.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images7/15A well-appointed libraryIn addition to his hefty record collection, John kept an extensive library of books, a glimpse of which can be seen in the background of this 1974 photo. According to Normans 1993 biography of the artist, John continued to return to Forbess bookstore, often buying out the entire window display. He loved books, Forbess wife, actor Nanette Newman, recalled to Norman. He wanted to have them, like we did, all through the house. But not just for show. When you talked to him, you realized how amazingly well-read he was.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images8/15Hanging out in the game roomThe iconic musicians game room, where he stands in this 1974 shot, was lined wall-to-wall with his RIAA certifications. He also decked it out with a pinball machine, a foosball table, a jukebox, a ping-pong table, a golf putter, and a neon Hercules sign.Mirrorpix/Getty Images9/15A magpies bedroomJohns display of his wide-ranging collections continued in his bedroom, which housed posters, paintings, Tiffany lamps, stuffed animals, and an intricately carved bed frameall of which can be seen in this 1974 photo. Im a magpie, the performer told AD in 1993 of his collecting nature. If I see something beautiful, I have to have it.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images10/15An entertainer onstage and at homeApparently, youd be unlikely to find any dust atop the piano that John plays in this 1974 photo. [His] house was immaculate, Newman said, per Normans biography of the star. Elton did the housework himself, and was incredibly house-proud. I remember one day [he and his manager and then boyfriend, John Reid, had] been over to us for lunch, and we were going back to the bungalow for tea. Elton rushed off in the car ahead of us. When we got there, he was frantically Hoovering the living room.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images11/15Glassware connoisseurIn this 1974 photo, John poses with the cabinet that housed his glasswareanother collection of the musicians that continued to grow and evolve. Im a huge collector of glass, the musician told The Guardian in 2016. I love it, and feel its the last great underrated area of creativity.Photo: Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images12/15Comforting collectionsArt Nouveau posters, paintings, and other works line the walls under the guard of Johns suit of armor in this 1974 photograph. For as long as I can remember, Ive always found collecting things oddly comforting, and Ive always enjoyed learning about things by collecting them, whether thats records or photographs or clothes or art, the musician wrote of his maximalist tendencies.Photo:Carl Bruin/Mirrorpix via Getty Images13/15Saying goodbye to HerculesJohn poses with his stuffed bear, Art Nouveau posters, and a neon Elton sign at Hercules in 1974. Within two years, the Your Song musicians bungalow could barely contain the myriad possessions stuffed into it and, in addition, had to be protected from marauding fans by an electronic security fence, Norman wrote. In early 1976, John listed the home for 125,000 ($1.17 million, adjusted for inflation), ultimately selling it for 80,000 later that year, according to Norman.Photo: Brian Cooke/Redferns/Getty Images14/15and hello to WoodsideJohn traded his Virginia Water dwelling for an estate in nearby Windsor, which he bought in 1974 for 400,000 (the equivalent of $5.4 million today). In this 1981 photo, the musician performs a song inside the eight-bedroom home, which he still maintains. The 37-acre estate, originally built in the 1500s, is just a few miles from Windsor Castle.Photo: Brian Cooke/Redferns/Getty Images15/15The Elton John aesthetic, in his own wordsIt was built in a mock-Georgian style, but when doing it up, I decided to eschew Regency or Palladian decoration in favour of a style known among interior design specialists as Mid-70s Pop Star On Drugs Goes Berserk, John wrote of the homepictured here in 1981in his autobiography. There were pinball machines, jukeboxes, brass palm trees, memorabilia everywhere. There were Tiffany lamps next to the pair of four-foot-high Doc Marten boots Id worn while singing Pinball Wizard in The Whos film Tommy. Ready for a fresh start, the Crocodile Rock singer auctioned off $8.2 million worth of his belongings in 1988 and then tapped designers Andrew Protheroe and Adrian Cooper-Grigg to completely rebuild the mansea three-year renovation that was featured in AD in 1993.