Weekend Wrap Up (03.15.13): Penthouse at the Pierre

The real estate gossip grapevine is all atwitter and agog over unconfirmed scuttlebutt that the titanic, 12,000 square foot triplex penthouse of recently deceased financier—and 1987 stock market crash predictor—Martin Zweig is about to hit the (open) market and may well fetch—some chatty Manhattan broker says—between $100 million and $120,000,000.

The positively palatial penthouse pad, perched proudly atop the super-posh Pierre on Fifth Avenue and purchased by Mister Zweig in 1999 for a then record breaking $21,500,000, was previously and long listed from in 2003 until the fall of 2008 with a then unfathomable $70,000,000 price tag. At that time listing information showed maintenance charges rang up $38,720 per month. That's a pearl clutching $464,640 every year for the privilege of living atop one of the most exclusive—if Old School—hotel and residential towers in all of New York City.

The ever industrious and well-connected kids at Curbed managed to turn up some photos and a floor plan from 1996 that—along with previous reports an old online listings—shows the 16-room suburban MacMansion-sized but oddly configured triplex has—or had—five proper bedrooms, seven full bathrooms plus a tight suite of three half crappers for large parties and events and an additional staff bedroom and bathroom. There are—or were—five functional fireplaces, four terraces, two reception rooms that flank an opera house worthy main staircase, a paneled library and a 42nd floor Grand Salon of—let's bet honest, children—epic proportions: 2,800 square feet with soaring 23-foot high coved ceiling, three towering arched windows and two sets of 20-foot tall French doors that connect to a pair of corner terraces with panoramic city and Central Park Views.

Cozier living quarters are located on the lowest level, the 41st floor, and include a surprisingly small kitchen and a corner living room with adjoining dining area/study. Other notable amenities include an oddly located sauna—on the 43rd floor opposite two guest bedrooms—and a private elevator that services all three floors of the penthouse.

The impossibly swish Pierre is the same building where a bevy of millionaire, billionaires, potentates and international power players own primary residences and pieds-a-terre. Just to list a couple there's Harrod's owner and British royal family hater Mohamed Al Fayed, media tycoon Sumner Redstone and fashion mogul/socialite Tory Burch who lives in a massive 9,000 square foot multi-unit combination spread on the 9th floor that she was granted in her divorce from obscenely rich venture capitalist Chris Burch.

Some of the children who follow these things closely will recall that fashion world icon Valentino's business partner and man-friend Giancarlo Giammetti sold his art-filled pad at The Pierre last year for $8,000,000. He bought the apartment, as it turns out, from Pierre Berge, an antique dealer better known in some circles as the former consort of French fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent.

listing photos: Brown Harris Stevens via Curbed
floor plan: Curbed