Marilynn K. Yee/The New York Times A duplex at 125 East 72nd Street was on the market for just three weeks.A graciously proportioned prewar duplex at 125 East 72nd Street, a corner combination situated to capture open city views to the north and east, ignited an uptown bidding war and sold for $12,315,000, the most expensive sale of the week, according to city records.
The 4,600-square-foot unit, No. 10/11B, was listed for $12 million, and it was on the market just three weeks before the bids exceeded the asking price.
The monthly maintenance charges are a relatively modest $7,601, because the 15-story brick building, built in 1917 and converted to co-ops in 1965, derives income from assorted retail outlets at its base.
The two levels of the 14-room apartment, located between Park and Lexington Avenues, are connected by a sweeping staircase with a hand-forged balustrade. The apartment has five bedrooms, four bathrooms and a powder room, with the reception and entertaining rooms arranged on the lower level. The double-size corner living room has a working fireplace; there is a paneled library, a formal dining room, a renovated chef’s kitchen and herringbone wood floors. The lower floor also contains a separate guest suite. There are Venetian plaster walls throughout much of the residence.
Upstairs, the home has four bedrooms, two of which share a bath, and an additional den/media room. The sequestered master wing has a bedroom with a fireplace and built-in desk, ample closets, a dressing room and an elegant master bath.
The sellers, Alexandre Chemla, the founder and president of Altour, and his wife, Lori, a philanthropist and arts patron, were represented by Joshua Wesoky of Sotheby’s International Realty. The duplex quickly found suitors, Mr. Wesoky said, because “it has beautiful light and views and a special floor plan that makes it feel like a home and is ideal for a family. Also, it has been completely renovated and beautifully maintained over the years and was in immaculate condition.â€
The buyers are Munib Islam, a partner at Daniel Loeb’s hedge fund, Third Point, and his wife, Kamila. Cathy Franklin of Brown Harris Stevens represented the buyers and was also the listing agent for a three-bedroom, four-and-a-half-bath simplex there, No. 10D, recently bought by Dylan Lauren, the daughter of the designer Ralph Lauren and owner of a candy store chain that bears her name, and her husband, Paul Arrouet. That unit sold for its asking price, $8.85 million.
Ten blocks south, a fully renovated Georgian-style limestone town house that spent three years on the market and saw its asking price dip to $13.5 million from $15 million during several shuffles of listing brokers, finally found a buyer. And, bam! The relieved seller, the television chef/brand Emeril Lagasse, can finally pursue his plan to downsize. But Mr. Lagasse, who four years ago paid $11.5 million for the 19-foot-wide, 6,900-square-foot residence at 158 East 61st Street, had to settle for that same sale amount on this go-round.
Although Serena Boardman of Sotheby’s was the most recent broker to list the home for sale, she declined, through a brokerage spokesman, to confirm her participation in the transaction. Mr. Lagasse used a limited liability company, Essagal Land, to thinly disguise his identity in public records; the buyer is a limited liability company, 158 Lex, with an address in Monroe Township, N.J.
The six-story town house, notable for a lipstick-red front door reminiscent of the beautician Elizabeth Arden’s Fifth Avenue flagship, has five bedrooms, six-and-a-half baths and four fireplaces. On the parlor floor, the ceilings soar to 14 feet, and beyond the entrance gallery there is a grand library, formal dining room, Smallbone of Devizes kitchen with a 150-bottle wine cave, a Carrara marble center island and marble floors with radiant heat.
The 17-by-25-foot living room has herringbone floors, an antique English fireplace and glass doors to a south terrace that overlooks the European-style back garden. The home, which has an elevator, has 1,000 square feet of outdoor space on various levels, with a solarium, media room, service kitchen and terrace on the top floor. The entire third floor is devoted to the lavish master suite; Mr. Lagasse apparently lived the same way he cooks, large.
Big Ticket includes closed sales from the previous week, ending Wednesday.
