Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Brooke Shields and Chris Henchy Dump SoHo Digs

SELLERS: Brooke Shields and Chris Henchy
LOCATION: New York City, NY
PRICE: $2,950,000
SIZE: 2,600 square feet (approximately), 2-3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms

YOUR MAMAS NOTES: As first reported earlier today in the New York Observer's always delectable Manhattan Transfers column, six-foot tall model, movie star and mommy of two Brooke Shields and her enviably accomplished writer/producer hubby Chris Henchy recently unloaded their loft-like co-operative apartment in New York City's SoHo 'hood to a fashion industry financier for $2,950,000. The loft was first listed on the (open) market in August (2011) with an asking price of $3,200,000.

Property records aren't entirely clear as to when Mister and Missus Shields-Henchy bought their SoHo spread or how much they paid for the approximately 2,600 square foot loft ringed with 27 windows and located on the fourth floor of a boo-teek building with direct frontage on busy busy busy lower Broadway just above Canal Street where, we've been told, a person can still buy a fairly good knock off Louis Vuitton Monogram Keepall for under a hundred-fifty bucks if you know who and how to ask.

Anyhoodles, the full-floor loft includes a key-lock, direct elevator entrance, a lavishly long living/dining room with adjacent 1,500 bottle wine cellar, and an open kitchen with custom wood cabinets and a massive pot rack that looms dangerously over a center island. The loft's current configuration allows for up to three bedrooms including a sizable master bedroom suite with custom fitted walk-in closet and a vintage style bathroom complete with claw-footed soaking tub, separate glass-enclosed shower and a custom double sink vanity. Other notable amenities include a separate laundry room, central air conditioning, and additional private storage space in the building's basement. Monthly fees for the loft, according to StreetEasy, run $2,800.



A piss-ant perusal of the property records show other residents of the pet friendly and fairly narrow nine-floor building include (but are not limited to) a broadcast news executive, an internationally renown photographer, an interior designer/glass artist, and a former vice president of JPMorgan Chase who paid $2,700,000 in April 2007 for the building's 7th floor unit, purchased from the estate of then (and still) deceased novelist Olivia Goldsmith (First Wives Club). As it turns out the JPMC VP has the newly and completely renovated (and never lived in) 3 bedroom and 2.5 bathroom loft back on the market with an asking price of $3,875,000.

Mister and Missus Henchy-Shields and their two tots have relocated to the 4-story Greek Revival-style townhouse in the West Village records indicate they bought in April 2008 for $5,500,000. The townhouse was gut-renovated and expanded by Brooklyn-based architects at MADE, the same folks who rather sublimely worked over Oscar-winning actress Julianne Moore's West Village townhouse located a just 5 or 6 blocks away and listed in summer 2009 and into 2010 at $11,995,000 and very briefly again in the spring of 2011 with a higher $12,500,000 price tag.

On the west coast Mister and Missus Henchy-Shields shack up in a 4 bedroom and 4 bathroom house in the ritzy Riviera section of Pacific Palisades (CA)—located just a few driveways down the impressive spread formerly owned by super producer Brian Grazer and now owned by the Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner family—that Miz Shields acquired in the months after her 1999 divorce from tennis titan Andre Agassi.

exterior photo (top left): Nicholas Strini for Property Shark
listing photos and floor plan: Stribling & Associates