Sunday, November 14, 2010

Weekend Wrap Up

1.
Your Mama knows almost nobody wants to know this, but the sale of financially battered and beleaguered actor Nic Cage's Bel Air mansion is finally complete. The deal is done, the deed is singed and this story is finally reached its conclusion. As far as we know from Billy Blabbedit, the Gerard Colcord designed mansion, formerly owned by both Dean Martin and Tom Jones, sold for $10,500,000. That's a lot of money by any standard but just a sliver of the whopping $35,000,000 Mister Cage and his real estate people thought the house was worth with it first come on the market in 2007.

2.
Earlier in the week Your Mama discussed the sprawling New York City apartment of Marie Claire Fashion Director and often exasperated Project Runway judge Nina Garcia and her financier huzband David Conrod.

Miz Garcia has baby number two in her belly, which may or may not have something to do with the with child couple's decision to move house. In the event Miz Garcia and Mister Conrod might want to save themselves some money by not moving Your Mama re-worked the floor plan of the apartment to accommodate him, her, baby #1 and baby #2.

One of the children, Stolidog, spent some time giving the floor plan a once over too and thoughtfully sent us another option for switching things up. See whatch'all think.

3.
The fine folks over at Curbed used Your Mama's little online endeavor to create a long (but "non-exhaustive") list of celebrity owned estate names such as Casa di Pace (Ryan Seacrest), Avec Chateau (one of Tyler Perry's many over-sized mansions), The Promised Land (Oprah Winfrey), Chartwell (the old Beverly Hillibillies mansion owned by media mogul Jerry Perenchio, and Red Barn, the Snedens Landing estate owned by Mikail Baryshnikov that he recently hoisted on the market with an asking price of $4,000,000.

4.
Jimmy Fallon, the former Saturday Night Live cast member turned late night tee-vee talk show house, and his wife Nancy Juvonen–otherwise known as Drew Barrymore's producing partner–forked over $1,350,000 for a third apartment at 34 Gramercy Park East, the oldest co-operative building in New York City. It's unknown– but it seems likely–that Mister Fallon and Miz Juvonen will doo-plex there current two-unit crib with the new 2 bedroom apartment they purchased upstairs.

5.
Somehow, in a haze of booze and sleepless nights, Your Mama missed this one. Did y'all know that Ricki Lake's Malibu beach rental house located just west of Topanga Beach burned to the damn ground a couple of months ago?

Lucky for Miz Lake, the entire family including the dog escaped unharmed. Not so lucky for Miz Lake is that she told police and fire people that the likely cause of the fire was a couch that went up in flames when she was trying to refuel a nearby portable heater. Also lucky for Miz Lake, she still owns a big house in the Brentwood area of Los Angeles that she bought from Courtney Cox in 2002 for $2,200,000.

6.
How many times has Your Mama told the children that rich and famous folks are fickle when it comes to their real estate. Fickle. Fickle. FICKLE. Six months or so ago, after whining to the press about how "shallow" Los Angeles is, Lisa Marie Presley packed up her horsey house in Hidden Hills, CA and decamped from the English countryside along with her huzband Michael Lockwood, their two year old twin daughters Harper and Finley, her 21-year old model daughter Riley and 18 year old son Benjamin from a previous betrothal.

There are many reports that say that Miz Presley shelled out eight or ten million pounds to purchase Coe Hall, an historic and huge house in Rotherford, East Sussex. However, Your Mama's spies–who had a peep and a poke around the property records–say that no transfer records were filed which indicates Miz Presley leased rather than bought the estate, some of which dates to the 15th-century and includes 11 bedrooms, 9 reception rooms, 9 poopers, a cinema, a state of the art sound system, swimming pool complex with hot tub, tennis court, parterre gardens, paddocks, and a private lake.

Coe Hall
had been on the sales market for quite some time but it was also, prior to Miz Presley moving in, listed at £15,000 per month so iffin in fact Miz Presley leased the property we expect she paid around that amount. Shortly after moving into Coe Hall, there were salacious reports about Miz Presley requiring her domestic staff sign confidentiality contracts that forbid them from telling anyone, including their spouses, where they worked. We have no idea if that's true or not but we do know that Coe Hall is just down the road a piece from the Britain's Scientology headquarters at Saint Hill Manor in East Grinstead.

Some of the updated and upgraded country house dates to the 15th-century and includes 11 bedrooms, 9 reception rooms, 9 poopers, movie theater, a state of the art sound system, swimming pool complex with hot tub, tennis court, parterre gardens, paddocks, and a private lake.

Turns out, bless her little heart, The Princess of Rock 'n Roll (allegedly) hates living in the English countryside and if she hasn't already soon plans to high-tailed it back to the United States.

Unfortunately for Miz Presley, she can't just move back to her house in Hidden Hills. That's because she's had it up for sale with an asking price of $6,995,000 and according to listing information, it's in contract. She still owns the much smaller and less swank 4 bedroom and 3 pooper house next door–where where her ex-huzband and baby daddy Danny Keough lived–but since it remains on the market with an asking price of $1,995,000 it would seem she's not headed back there. Maybe she's shacking up with Momma Presley in Beverly Hills? Maybe she's moving to Nashville. Maybe it's all big fat wrong rumor and she's staying in the U.K. at Coe Hall. Who knows?

6 comments:

Housey said...

I made some changes on that apartment myself. Just a few little things. Basically opened it up a bit. That place has a ton of wasted space.

http://i52.tinypic.com/2gy7ed4.jpg

Anonymous said...

The plan fixes you all are trying show what amatures you all are. In New York City's pre-war buildings you are NEVER allowed to extend "Wet" spaces (bathrooms, kitchens, powder rooms) over "Dry" spaces(halls, bedrooms, living rooms, etc.).
Leave the architecture to the adults.

Sylvia Fowler said...

ooooooh anon 9:56 you made me just wet my pants! wow!

Anonymous said...

Mama:

We are puzzled by the comment of Anonymous, Nov. 14, 9:56 p.m., and can think of multiple expansions of kitchens and baths in New York Prewars. Kitchens are frequently extended into maids rooms, and master baths are frequently extended into adjacent bedrooms. Examples? The prior owners of 4 East 66th street, fifth floor, installed a second master bathroom in an adjoining bedroom with a fireplace, and maintained the fireplace in the new bathroom. The prior owners of a 920 Fifth Avenue B-line apartment installed a powder room in a former closet. Multiple San Remo owners have expanded their kitchens into maids rooms and have also installed powder rooms into former closets. Heavens, have all these remodels been done without permits?

Mama, we especially appreciated your proposed remodel of the Garcia-Conrad apartment. We believe that the issues concerning amateur recommendations hinge more on structural and plumbing feasibilities.

Your Trenton Five

Anonymous said...

Plumbing walls in multi unit residential buildings cannot be added after the building is constructed. Pipes and vents cannot be added unless they align within the walls of the spaces above and below the floor being renovated all the way from the lower level sewer connection up to the roof vents.
Most of the time sinks and toilets can only be moved a few feet from their original location.

Anonymous said...

If it makes all you purists feel any better, i live in one of the buildings Mama named in this weekend's wrap up, and someone was allowed to put a kitchen no less, over a bedroom. There was absolutely no precedent for it...the board was severely remiss in doing so.