Wednesday, November 27, 2013

David Koepp Lists Manhattan Townhouse

SELLER: David Koepp
LOCATION: New York City, NY
PRICE: $9,900,000
SIZE: 5,000(ish) square feet, 4-5 bedrooms, 3 full and 1 or maybe to half bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: A quick spin through some of the newer property listings in New York City turned up a townhouse on the Upper West Side listed for $9.9 million and owned, as per property records, by David Koepp.*

Mister Koepp's name may not ring your Tinseltown bells but he is, to be sure, an notably tall, bespectacled, and unusually successful screenwriter (and director) of action-oriented blockbuster movies such as Jurrasic Park and its sequel The Lost World: Jurrasic Park, Mission: Impossible, Spider-Man, War of the Worlds, Panic Room, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, and Premium Rush. In the mid-Aughts Mister Koepp wrote and executive produced the short-lived network series Hack and, although he briefly backed out of the project in 2012, he penned the upcoming second installment of the Snow White and the Huntsman franchise.

Property records show Mister Koepp and his first wife, artist and occasional actress Rosario Varela, acquired the meticulously maintained and updated 1870s townhouse in January 1999 for $3,250,000. In 2004 Mister Koepp bought out first Missus Koepp and, as far as we know, Mister Koepp remained (and remains) in residence with his second wife, Melissa Thomas.

Current listing details show the urban single family residence, just a few doors off Central Park with interiors by accomplished lady-decorator Fawn Galli, has about 5,000 square feet with 4-5 bedrooms, 3.5 bathrooms, two fireplaces, an elevator that serves four of the five floors, a sky-lit laundry room on the top floor, and a multi-level garden.

Floor plans and listing photographs included with digital marketing materials show the raised stoop entry on the parlor floor high ceilings and chevron pattern wood floors. A small vestibule entry links to an over-sized foyer—with butterfly-pattern wallpaper and wall-mounted faux zebra bust—that does double duty as a formal dining room. A small study off the entry vestibule overlooks the sparsely tree-lined street and could be pressed into use as a bedroom if necessary and/or desired. At the rear of the parlor floor the formal living room opens through multi-paned doors to a small balcony with corkscrew staircase that winds down to the garden two floors below.

The ground floor comprises a floor-through, loft-like space with top-quality kitchen with marble counter tops and an adjoining mud room street entrance, a casual dining area, and a roomy family room that, like the formal living room directly above it, also opens to a small balcony that connects via exterior corkscrew staircase to the garden. Although listing details indicate there's a powder room on the ground floor, as far as these boozy-woozy eyeballs can tell from a thorough perusal of the floor plan, there isn't a bathroom on this level so anyone with a need to evacuate must ascend to the vermilion-walled powder room just off the formal dining room or descend to the (English) basement where there's a windowless three-quarter pooper along. Also down in the garden level basement are a large storage room, a small sitting area and a fireplace-equipped media room with built-in entertainment center and direct garden access.

The good-sized garden view master bedroom on the second floor has a dressing room lined with closets and a Jack 'n' Jill type bathroom that is—regretably—shared with the a second, street-facing bedroom. Two more generously proportioned bedrooms on the uppermost floor share a hall bathroom with separate tub and shower.

Property records how Mister Koepp still owns another apartment in modern building on Columbus Avenue that he picked up in August 2002 for $1,575,000 and in March (2011) he and his second missus shelled out $3.85 million for a land-locked mini-estate in the low-key but hideously expensive Hamptons community of Amagansett, NY.

*Mister Koepp's surname, in case any of you want to know, is pronounced kepp.

listing photos and floor plan: Douglas Elliman

10 comments:

lil' gay boy said...

Ditch the zebra & I'm ready to move in; that garden in NYC, and just "steps from Central Park"?

*heaven*

Happy Hanukkah & Thanksgiving to one and all!

Unknown said...

Yes this is a nice property. I just want to buy this for my family. It ll be a perfect gift for them. Is there any discount offer present for this property? Please give some information and help me to buy it.Thanks for sharing this.

robroy said...

I'll bet cash money that the bedroom at the other end of the jack'n'jill bath is used as a study or formerly as a nursery. That floorplan is actually pretty frickin functional.

My one question would be why dining rooms on each of the two lower levels. I could see a formal one on the entry floor and the second off the kitchen but the one on the garden level has me scrathing my head? Game table maybe. I could however completely see a bar being housed there.

Anonymous said...

Mama'sBoy luvs U!

Anonymous said...

With its Upper West Side location, proximity to Central Park and Fairway Market, and a list price under $10,000,000, this home is a genuine religious experience! It would be relatively easy to add additional baths, with showers if not tubs, adjacent to the existing baths on each of the bedroom levels. The Rabbi assumed the zebra was paper mâché, if its taxidermy, out it goes, along with the butterfly wallpaper and the garden level dining set!

Happy Chanukah and Happy Thanksgiving to Mama, Dr. Cooter, and the Kinderlach. The Thanksgiving parade is on, the balloons are soaring, and the Rabbi is extraordinarily grateful for the blessings of friends, family, and loved ones.

Rabbi Hedda LaCasa

Sandpiper said...


Happy Thanksgiving! Mama and the good Dr. Cooter, take the day off! Seriously. xoxo

The facade, staircase, built-ins and garden are outstanding. Otherwise the interior shell has classic brownstone challenges: a long narrow tube, bright on the ends, dark in the middle, and in this case standard ceiling height. Had one, gratefully with high ceilings and windows. Charming? Of course. Okay about moving, you bet.

PSA:
Please skip if you're pro-poaching. Thank you.

About the zebra head, real or FAO Schwarz, it further encourages some in the design community's demand for and subsequent exploitation of innocent creatures -- for the shallow sake of whimsy on a wall or floor.

If the following weren't so sad I'd have to laugh. One designer's blog explains that her vendor promises these heads and rugs are from animals that die of natural causes. Huh? Tell that to the zebra farms that let you pre-select the hide of your choice.

Sorry Mama, but thank you for letting me speak my mind.


Rosco Mare said...

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone, especially to our Mama Dearest who thankfully writes this post, and has brought new vocabulary, such as "day-core," into our lives.

...and happy Hanukkah to our dear Rabbi Hedda.

Cheers and mazel tov!

Rosco Mare

Anonymous said...

I want those dining chairs - and the lamp! Wow! Gorgeous :-)

Anonymous said...

I worked as a nanny for the Koepps for a year... this house is pretty great.

the zebra is definitely paper mache and the butterfly wallpaper and color scheme was pretty bad - it could stand for some new sprucing. It's a great house though...

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