One of the city¿s most impressive and hip palazzos is the brown-brick, 5-story building at 11 Spring Street on the northeast corner of Elizabeth Street in Nolita, just down the block from the even more imposing limestone building on the northwest corner of Spring Street and the Bowery that is owned by Jay Meisel, a photographer, and was formerly the Germania Bank building.
With its two large and four small arches on the ground floor of its long frontage on Elizabeth Street, and its quoined window enclosures and corbelled ¿V¿ cornice and its rounded corner, the building at 11 Spring Street would almost seem fit for a Henry Villard, or Otto Kahn, or perhaps some movie mogul eager to do the definitive film on graffiti since its base is brilliantly colored and papered with shreds of posters and overlays of graffiti.
Indeed, the building seemed fit enough to be bought not too long ago for about $5,250,000 by Lachlan Murdoch, the son of Rupert Murdoch, the communications magnate.
Mr. Murdoch planned a major clean-up and renovation, but decided to relocate and earlier this year the building was listed for sale for about $14,750,000 and then recently its listing on the webpage of Deborah Grubman, Carol Cohen and Brooks Nicolson at Corcoran had a big ¿SOLD¿ sign on it.
The listing said that the building was ¿built in 1888 as a horse stable¿ and that the ¿14,000 square foot building features over 60 windows, intricate stone details and the lost craftsmanship of 19th century masonry work.¿
Department of Finance records still do not indicate a recent sale, but a well-dressed man accompanying another man with a rolling yardstick pacing around the building and talking about "opening up" the bulding's now sealed ground floor arches responded to CityRealty.com questions and confirmed that the building is now going to be divided into condominium apartments and that the architect for the project is Asfour Guzy, who had drawn up plans for the building¿s use as a quite grand single-family residence. The man on the street, however, declined to identify the buyer of the building and other details of its conversion.
A item today on Curbed.com indicated that the ¿building is going condo, with construction to begin in about a month.¿ ¿The rumored buyer? Malcolm Stevenson by name, a man about which we known precious little (no thanks to Google),¿ it continued. A Google search for that name turns up lots of references to Malcolm Stevenson Forbes Jr., the publisher of Forbes magazine.
Curbed.com has previously described the building as ¿the Street Art Shrine,¿ ¿The Freaking Coolest Building in Nolita,¿ and ¿Our One True Love.¿
Documents filed today, however, with the Department of Buildings indicated that the new owner might be William Elias of West Palm Beach Florida and the listed phone number is answered ¿William Elias Management and Construction.¿
On his website Asfour Guzy shows his plans for a 7-story single residence for the building (counting cellar and penthouse) and notes that ¿A four-story sky-lit staircase and elevator core organize the project¿s program by connecting the main bedroom suites of the third floor with a casual family room at the penthouse level.¿
The building is catty-corner to Barmarch¿ and there are numerous restaurants nearby and there is a large sculpture garden in the middle of the tree-lined block on Elizabeth Street between Spring and Prince Street.
Several windows are now boarded up but a recent photograph showed them with tied curtains.
With its two large and four small arches on the ground floor of its long frontage on Elizabeth Street, and its quoined window enclosures and corbelled ¿V¿ cornice and its rounded corner, the building at 11 Spring Street would almost seem fit for a Henry Villard, or Otto Kahn, or perhaps some movie mogul eager to do the definitive film on graffiti since its base is brilliantly colored and papered with shreds of posters and overlays of graffiti.
Indeed, the building seemed fit enough to be bought not too long ago for about $5,250,000 by Lachlan Murdoch, the son of Rupert Murdoch, the communications magnate.
Mr. Murdoch planned a major clean-up and renovation, but decided to relocate and earlier this year the building was listed for sale for about $14,750,000 and then recently its listing on the webpage of Deborah Grubman, Carol Cohen and Brooks Nicolson at Corcoran had a big ¿SOLD¿ sign on it.
The listing said that the building was ¿built in 1888 as a horse stable¿ and that the ¿14,000 square foot building features over 60 windows, intricate stone details and the lost craftsmanship of 19th century masonry work.¿
Department of Finance records still do not indicate a recent sale, but a well-dressed man accompanying another man with a rolling yardstick pacing around the building and talking about "opening up" the bulding's now sealed ground floor arches responded to CityRealty.com questions and confirmed that the building is now going to be divided into condominium apartments and that the architect for the project is Asfour Guzy, who had drawn up plans for the building¿s use as a quite grand single-family residence. The man on the street, however, declined to identify the buyer of the building and other details of its conversion.
A item today on Curbed.com indicated that the ¿building is going condo, with construction to begin in about a month.¿ ¿The rumored buyer? Malcolm Stevenson by name, a man about which we known precious little (no thanks to Google),¿ it continued. A Google search for that name turns up lots of references to Malcolm Stevenson Forbes Jr., the publisher of Forbes magazine.
Curbed.com has previously described the building as ¿the Street Art Shrine,¿ ¿The Freaking Coolest Building in Nolita,¿ and ¿Our One True Love.¿
Documents filed today, however, with the Department of Buildings indicated that the new owner might be William Elias of West Palm Beach Florida and the listed phone number is answered ¿William Elias Management and Construction.¿
On his website Asfour Guzy shows his plans for a 7-story single residence for the building (counting cellar and penthouse) and notes that ¿A four-story sky-lit staircase and elevator core organize the project¿s program by connecting the main bedroom suites of the third floor with a casual family room at the penthouse level.¿
The building is catty-corner to Barmarch¿ and there are numerous restaurants nearby and there is a large sculpture garden in the middle of the tree-lined block on Elizabeth Street between Spring and Prince Street.
Several windows are now boarded up but a recent photograph showed them with tied curtains.
Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
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