Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Radio Hostess and Heiress Alexis Stewart Marks Down Penthouse Price

We know we're a little late to the rodeo on this bit of real estate bizness it having already been discussed on Curbed. None the less, we've been following this real estate saga for some time and quite simply can't control our impulse to weigh in on the matter. Plus we're sort of smitten with the idiosyncratic pluck of radio hostess and heiress Alexis Stewart. Iffin you already know this crap and don't want to hear about it again just move along like good little doggies and Your Mama will have another celebrity real estate bone for you soon.

With housekeeping honcho Martha Stewart's radio co-host daughter Alexis ensconced in her elephantine triplex in one of the celebrity-packed Richard Meier towers on New York City's bizzy bizzy bizzy West Side Highway, it seems she might finally be getting serious about unloading her previous penthouse pad located atop The Ice House building on TriBeCa's North Moore Street.

Property records show Miss Stewart–presumably with some money from mommy–purchased her loft-like duplex penthouse at The Ice House in May of 1999 for $2,953,000. She first tried to sell the 3,884 square foot aerie in September of 2007 with an asking price of $12,400,000. Nine months after first appearing on the open market Miss Stewart's apartment at The Ice House was taken off the market and seven months after that it was re-listed with a notably higher price tag of $12,950,000. By November of 2010 the price had plummeted to $10,450,000 and in mid-January 2011 Miss Stewart and her Real Estates slashed the asking price to $9,500,000. Perhaps finally selling her old penthouse is sassy Miss Stewart's New Year's resolution.

Miss Stewart's real estate white elephant at The Ice House includes private elevator access, 2-3 bedrooms, 3.5 poopers, a living room with fireplace and dramatic pitched-glass ceiling, a gore-may kitchen even a domestic dervish like her mother Martha could appreciate and a 500+ square foot terrace. Listing information shows the common charges and taxes total $6,590 per month.

Miss Stewart's current crib is a collection of contiguous apartments on three floors that were bought for a combined cost of around $35,000,000. No babies, that is not a error. Miss Stewart's digs actually cost her–or, more likely, her mother–around thirty-five million smackers, a blood curdling amount of moolah that does not include the many millions more spent on the combination, renovation and decoration of the super-sized condo.

Miss Stewart's penthouse at The Ice House was done up by nice, gay decorator–and Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia employee–Kevin Sharkey and although we have no inside information or hard evidence to prove it, Your Mama would bet our long bodied bitches Linda and Beverly that it was Mister Sharkey who did up the day-core at Miss Alexis's new mansion in the Meier-designed tower.

Probably not coincidentally Mister Sharkey lives in a lavish spread in a recently-debuted-to-the-public apartment in the very same Richard Meier-designed building as Miss Stewart. While we're having trouble sorting out the property records it appears to Your Mama that Mister Sharkey's apartment is contiguous with Miss Stewart's multi-unit spread and might actually be one of the five apartments purchased by Miss Stewart and (allegedly) paid for by her momma.

Among the many dazzling photos of Mister Sharkey's apartment, one in particular caught Your Mama's eye. The photo shows Mister Sharkey and Miss Stewart, both in cocktail party attire, sitting on the tile floor of a bathroom with a bathtub full of Veuve Clicquot champagne and a frameless glass shower stall stacked to the ceiling with dozens and dozens of iconic orange Hermès gift boxes. While we love love love the color orange and we adore all things Hermès, Your Mama just doesn't understand the impulse of a certain kind of design queen who feels compelled to display Hermès gift boxes as if they are day-core. We happen to think Mister Sharkey is a talented and accomplished gentleman but bitch, pleeze. Really? The only reason we can conjure to explain why a person would use Hermès boxes as "day-core" is that they want to–as George says in Edward Albee's brilliant play Who's Afraid of Virginia–"impress the guests." The whole thing is a little unseemly and, quite frankly, it's even more unseemly to stack and "stash" dozens upon dozens of orange boxes in an all-glass shower in a feeble attempt to look like you don't care that much about them even though their careful arrangement screams another something else entirely.

Say what you may about Big Bad Martha Stewart but for where Your Mama sits she's an undeniably generous parent whose vast fortune allows her only daughter to live like a modern day tsarina and an unusually magnanimous (if notoriously persnickety) boss who pays at least one of her favored employees enough dough-ray-me to live in one of New York's most illustrious and exceedingly expensive buildings.

We should all be so damn lucky.

floor plan: Prudential Douglas Elliman Real Estate via Streeteasy

10 comments:

Southgate said...

I just love how the caption for the Hermes shower says "
"Kevin's beloved collection of Hermes boxes is cleverly stored in the shower and adds a bold kick of color to the bathroom. "

Pray, what is "clever" about loading a shower up with boxes??

Anonymous said...

And to think it all began with baking some cakes. Only in America.

Jimbo said...

From the photos of the party given by Kevin Sharkey in his apartment it would appear that Miss Stewart and he are an item. Could he be straight and a decorator? Maybe that's what all the orange boxes are about.

Anonymous said...

That party just looks ridiculous! Alexis has the biggest, most unsightly feet I've evern seen. Ugh!

Anonymous said...

The stupid orange boxes in the shower looks ridiculous.
And what happens if some poor sod wants to actually take a shower?
Move 'em out, move 'em in.
Stoopid!!
The Aussie
And sartnedi (my word of the day) to you too!

Anonymous said...

Is that the apartment that was owned by sportscaster Warner Wolf and his wife? [There are two side-by-side penthouses in the building; I think the other was owned by Billy Crystal.]

Madam Pince said...

jimbo, rest assured that kevin sharkey bats for the other team. i followed the reno of his apartment in mama stewart's magazine, and let's just say mr. sharkey spends freely. alexis is an ungrateful, carping bitch, but i still tune in to the radio show she does with jennifer hutt ever day.

Aunt Gina said...

when the idle rich play ping pong with monogrammed paddles, keeping score on their penthouse wall using Chanel lipstick, one begins to understand the guillotine.

Anonymous said...

OMG - Aunt Gina, RIGHT ON THE MARK! Love it - thanks Moma. Much love....

Anonymous said...

Okay, from someone with some knowledge (and I emphasize some because it goes back a few years though I am sure nothing has changed), here goes.
No, no, no to the suggestion above that Kevin Sharkey and Alexis are an item. They are indeed good friends, but are most tied to one another by the fact that Martha has basically adopted Kevin as the son she never had. Kevin is 40 something and wears skinny suits by Thom Browne with trousers hemmed 2 inches up his sockless ankles. 'Nuff said? He was on the infamous Christmas flight to Mexico when Martha got the call suggesting that she sell her Imclone stock. He was on the list to testify at the trial. Whether or not he actually did, I don't know, but I suspect some of Martha's devotion to him may have to do with what he did not say to prosecutors. . . just sayin'.
Indeed, a few of Martha's key employees who were there when the company went public got very rich. They were selling their stock as fast as they could when it was in the high 20's (it's now at 4 something and has been for a long time). Kevin was most definitely not in that group. I would bet Martha owns his apartment. Trust me on this one, no editor at that company is making anywhere near enough to afford that place. If he bought with his own money, it's money from family.
Yes, Kevin is involved in the decoration of Alexis's new pad, but certainly not anything to do with combining or structure. It's furniture, fabric, rugs, etc, the typical decorator stuff. However, Alexis has very clear opinions about all of this, and a very developed design philosophy. She's just not about to run around town hunting and gathering. She'll let Kevin do that.
When Alexis's Tribeca apartment was published in the magazine, it became quite the brunt of jokes that linked its extremely cold and clinical atmosphere to the personality of its owner. It has not sold because it is overpriced, and because most people don't like the design. They think it actually should be under priced because they are going to have to renovate.