Moby Flips New York State Mid-Century Modern for Progressive Causes
By Mark David
LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – Moby announced via Instagram this week he owns a “beautiful house” in the spectacularly scenic, semi-rural community of Pound Ridge, N.Y., — about 50 miles northeast of Midtown Manhattan and a bit more than 15 miles north from where he was brought up in Darien, Conn. — that the mononymic West Coast-based electronic music pioneer quietly acquired just four months ago for $1.24 million but, after he realized he won’t spend much time there, flipped back on the market at $1.3 million. Although it seems unlikely he will turn much if any profit once carrying costs, improvement expenses and real estate fees are factored in, the avid and savvy architecture and design aficionado pledged, again via Instagram , to donate proceeds of the sale to “support progressive political candidates, support my animal rights foundation, produce documentaries, and fund scholarships.”
Designed by a Frank Lloyd Wright apprentice David Henken and built in 1956 on a sun-dappled slope amid a dense woodland under a cheeky butterfly roof, the romantically sited two-story residence has two to three bedrooms and three modern bathrooms in 3,162-square-feet of what marketing materials describe as a “soothing, urbane aesthetic” with a rustic mix of hardwood and freeform slate floors, mahogany-clad ceilings, seamless mahogany paneled walls and mitered glass picture windows. The spacious, L-shaped combination living and dining room pivots on its inside corner around an interestingly articulated and cleverly positioned two-sided fireplace and two soaring sweeps of floor-to-ceiling picture windows meet in a corner to provide the sun-filled space a panoramic view of the bucolic surroundings.
The galley style kitchen isn’t especially big but does manage to squeeze in a wee breakfast nook and is stylishly fitted with vertically striated flat-panel cabinetry, almost delicately slim marble countertops and shimmering stainless steel penny tile backsplashes that inject the otherwise crisply organic space with a glitzy twinge of showbiz glamour. A massive, raised hearth stone fireplace dominates a cozy, carpeted den and, downstairs, a gym is joined by a roomy library/office built around a natural rock formation with a glossy, smooth paneled wood ceiling and another chunky stone fireplace. One guest bedroom is en suite and surprisingly ample; Another is far more petite in size and adroitly fitted like a ship’s compartment with a built-in bed and a built-in dresser that extends somewhat impractically clear to the ceiling; And the airy master bedroom features a wedge-shaped wall of floor-to-ceiling windows, a narrow, stone-paved sun porch, and a slightly compact, crisply modern bathroom fitted with a floating vanity and a combination tub/shower sheathed in over-scaled white tiles.
Slender decks and stone terraces give way to loosely but picturesquely landscaped grounds that incorporate a small pond, a variety of specimen trees, rolling lawns, and an unfussy rectangular swimming pool set into a stone terrace against an untamed forest.
As a frequent buyer and seller of architecturally notable and/or offbeat residences in and around both New York City and Los Angeles, the multi-talented musician has been a property gossip column staple for more than a decade. In 2005 he impulsively paid $4.5 million for a quirky quadruplex penthouse in one of the two towers of the tony Eldorado building on New York City’s Central Park West that he sold in 2008 after about a year on the market at $6.7 million ; He once owned Wolf’s Lair, an illustrious, castle-like residence high above L.A.’s Lake Hollywood, that he shed in late 2014 for $12.4 million ; And more recently, in 2016, and just down the street from another house he owns, he snatched up an historic Tudor in a plum pocket of L.A.’s Los Feliz for $3.4 million , gave it a modern-edged renovation and sold it earlier this year for $4.91 million to Leonardo DiCaprio.
Listing photos: Ginnel Real Estate
