English: The two-story mansion was of Italianate architecture as evidenced by its neo-Romanesque columns all around. During the early part of World War II, the guerilla forces under American command were constrained to raze the mansion to the ground so as to keep the occupying Japanese forces from using it as headquarters. The resulting 3-day inferno brought down the roof and the two-inch wooden floors, but the entire skeletal frame remains intact to this day. Now, the remains of the burnt mansion is a majestic sight to behold. Its huge, ornately designed fountain reminiscent of those in piazzas around Italy stands proud by the front entrance of the mansion, back-dropped by the Simborio – the smokestack outside where the ancestral home used to be, which actually was the vent used for milling fine mascovado sugar at the plantation.