Prestige Property: 22 Leyden Avenue, Portsea VIC
An architectural masterstroke is one of the peninsula’s finest homes.
By Terry Christodoulou
Fri, May 7, 2021 3:40pm
< 1 min
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Portsea has long been the coastal playground of choice for Melbourne’s well-heeled. Here, is one of the private peninsula’s finest.
This stately, 5-bedroom, 4-bathroom, 7-car parking property, of 3047sqm, enjoys an enviable location in the Portsea cul-de-sac overlooking Percy Cerutty oval.
Embracing a Hamptons-inspired, timeless style – every feature and material is of the highest quality, providing the ultimate family compound for multi-generational living.
Designed by Stephen Akehurst, the home is split into two buildings, separated by a central garden and 15-metre pool.
The main residence sees communal spaces, with hardwood flooring underfoot. Here, a chef’s kitchen fitted with a Paul Bocuse oven with butler’s pantry sits alongside a dining and living room, with open fire.
A private parent’s retreat is downstairs, with gas log fire and cellar and bar adding some adult sophistication to the space.
Additionally, a stone terrace runs the length of the building, serving as a spectacular setting for alfresco dining with integrated BBQ, pizza oven and woodfire.
Across the garden sees the second residence, providing three further bedrooms, two, bathrooms, a living space with gas log fireplace and a large lower floor rumpus. Also, here, basement and security parking for multiple vehicles.
However, it’s the gardens – designed by Robert Boden – that steal the show, playing host to a championship sized mod-grass tennis court, established hedges, stone paving and the aforementioned heated, self-cleaning saltwater pool.
The listing is with Rob Curtain (+61 418 310 870) of Peninsula Sotheby’s International, price guide between $15m-$16m. melbournesothebysrealty.com
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A five-bedroom Palo Alto home designed by Steven Ehrlich is listed for $44 million, making it the city’s most expensive listing. Built around a dramatic concrete spine, the home features four courtyards and a pool.
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For years, tech entrepreneur Asher Waldfogel and his wife, Helyn MacLean, dreamed of building a modern house in Palo Alto, Calif.
The couple, however, worried about clashing with the Mediterranean-style architecture typically associated with their neighborhood of Old Palo Alto.
So they tapped architect Steven Ehrlich to create a design that paid homage to its surroundings with stucco, mahogany and titanium zinc cladding. They spent $20 million over several years building the house, completed in 2005.
Now looking to be closer to their adult daughter on the East Coast, they are putting the five-bedroom home on the market for $44 million—the most expensive listing in Palo Alto.
Waldfogel is an angel investor who co-founded Redback Networks, a telecommunications-equipment company. MacLean previously had a career in fundraising.
The couple purchased the roughly 0.4-acre site for $7.1 million in 2000 and demolished a circa-1930s Spanish Colonial home. The house they built pinwheels around a central staircase. It has 7,900 square feet of livable space, with four distinct courtyards and a pool.
A key feature of the home is a cast-in-place concrete wall, or spine, that is two stories high and about 80 feet long. “There’s a little bit of controlled chaos in what comes out of the form,” unlike a perfectly uniform surface, Waldfogel said. “If you want that, you do it in plastic.”
Waldfogel said he and his wife are thinking about the next phase of life now that their daughter is grown, although they have not decided where they will move. They also have a home in Sun Valley, Idaho.
“Right now we’re just trying to emotionally let go and decide what to do next,” he said.
Palo Alto, an epicenter of venture capital and tech startups in Silicon Valley, is home to some of the country’s biggest tech titans. Sales volume and prices are rising, with a median sale price of $3.5 million for the three months ending in August, up 5.8% year-over-year, according to real-estate brokerage Redfin.
Arthur Sharif of Sotheby’s International Realty—San Francisco Brokerage has the listing.
