Touring a 400 Year Old Gothic Mansion in NEW YORK CITY | Landmarked EP 4
[Music] [Music] this is the first time in over 50 years the has had a glimpse inside this home this Mansion is one of the last architecturally significant tow houses that's currently available for private ownership in New York City with a history rivaling any notable residents in the United States now as The Story Goes the home was originally built by wealthy Dutch owners in Amsterdam in the 17th century over 400 years ago then if you can believe this the home was then dismantled and shipped across the Atlantic Ocean to the Upper West Side in 1845 so while this is extremely rare I've actually heard of this before with freestanding Stone masonary structures being built and then disassembled only to be moved and reassembled but to ship this across the Atlantic Ocean in [Music] 1845 as if this story wasn't uh a tall T enough then apparently in 1910 it was relocated again from the Upper West Side to grar park the neighborhood where we're currently standing very interesting with a lot of these older houses in the city the true history is extremely hard to find and this is what I was able to dig up from the internet but also from the listing agent himself very peculiar history this home so from the street this is one of the most imposing houses on the Block as far as the feeling the facade like I mentioned is that Flemish theme as far as the uh actual architectural style it is gothic as far as the area in the neighborhood we're in gry park very quiet it is very high-end but if you look at the architecture the homes in the neighborhood they are all old world and this I believe is one of the oldest even if you look at some of the details on the Lim stoning you can see how weathered away it is yeah this is a one of one let's head inside and right from the sidewalk this is the first unique element so typically you would walk up into a townhouse we're walking down so right from the street you have those Gothic themes look at this Limestone Arch here check this out rod iron front door gate they have a ring camera but you'll see later in the tour there's a uh 1980s old telephone video camera that I'll show you later one theme throughout the house is the use of the carings on the mahogany here we have a coat of arms with two stars with a stripe dividing it there's actually a wasp on either side as well I'm not sure the significance of that again comment down below if you are a historian or an architect and you can add some uh info in the comments here oh this has got some weight to him welcome into the gothic townhouse if you walk forward we'll give you a quick peek of what's to come very quick that's all you're going to see I wanted to start this tour in detail with the entry here you get another look at the other side of the door this whole entryway is limestone and you can see that it is very very weathered and aged and in my opinion that's a cool thing if you are buying this house you are a history buff you're an old soul you're not looking for a white box and details like the cracks in the limestone in my opinion that just gives it that that rooting in history if you know what I mean in the entry wave right off to my side here this is a powder room have a little peek in here and even if you look down below the tiling you can tell just by the tiling how smooth are that they are so weathered by feet walking over them for hundreds of years at this point from the foyer this is where it gets very interesting so there's a separate entrance for the staff and I'll actually show you back out on the street view here so again it's a sunken entrance going below street level which back in the day I'll head on inside this will be the entrance for the team maintaining your home and for a home like this in that time period you would have 5 to 10 people living in your house with you sign simultaneously and this is the stairwell for the staff there's actually no light in this stairwell we'll go up there in a second but before that I want to show you the dumb waiter for the kitchen which is actually on the top floor watch till the end because the kitchen in my opinion I mean you'll see when we get there but we are going to start the tour in a bit of a different way heading down to the basement first we'll have to navigate this very carefully the stairs are slippery I actually always say we walk down here the first time Blake so watch out on the bottom one so here we have all of the HVAC the water tanks and at the very end here of the mechanical look at this room welcome to your wine seller and I actually we need lighting down here because actually look at that no more phone flashlight but this is the wine seller and it is pretty ridiculous because you can see the actual beams holding up the house look how thick these beams are so yeah I do believe that this was actually built deconstructed and shipped across the Atlantic just based on like look how old this is and then again you have the red brick everywhere a little fireplace with a religious Motif over top actually what that's a guy holding a head is that not yes that's that's a that's a woman holding a head we've got what looks like a monk here with a cross on the far wall the wine racks there's actually a back exit from the wine Celler look at this staircase uh this is definitely not the original staircase this might be the steepest stairwell in the city which then leads to this salarium at the back of the house look how beautiful this is look at the metal work here you have this huge seashell gargoyle Fountain front and center here with a little pool at the bottom and then this beautiful glass glass work here built into the Limestone which leads us check this out the barrel vaated ceiling great room in this Gothic townhouse so we have 20t ceilings in here and if you look up at these ceilings you have the most intricate beautiful working of these patterns which I would guess represent the flower of life this is all sacred geometry it's very aesthetic to the eye at the very end of this gray room we have a coat of arms on the walls you have mahogany mill work going at least I'd say I don't know off the top of my head that's at least probably 16 ft and then at the bottom here look at this original radiator running the entire length of this great room built right in here and this you can't not mention the fact that there is like an 8ft tall fireplace in this home like look how large this is and then again carved in here you have the Flower of Life all that again this is a wood burning fireplace it's actually working and then at the far end end of the great room more than mahogany we have two doors which lead right to where we started the tour in the main entry area and uh now for the the cool stuff not that what we just showed you wasn't cool but look at the staircase first off look at the door and the woodwork here look how ornate that is so I want to thank the sponsor of this week's episode better help and in doing so I wanted to share something for my own personal Journey working with a therapist so the thing about therapy a lot of times when someone hears the word therapist they think oh something's wrong I need to see a therapist because this is wrong or that's wrong but that's the farthest from the truth knowing thyself is the ultimate power one can achieve in this life knowing why you react to certain things how you do knowing things that set you off the incredible thing about therapy is that if you do find that right person that right therapist you can unlock man you can unlock your greatest superpowers and that's where better help comes in better help is the largest online platform for tella Health Therapy meaning it's all virtual none of it's in person it's through the phone therapy like I've mentioned is a lot like dating you're going to try out a few therapists before you find the right one and that can sometimes be discouraging but you just have to know that when you do find that person that person that you feel comfortable who has the wisdom the development and knowledge who aligns with what you're looking to achieve the results can be quite astounding better help's given us a code for Discount which I've linked Down Below in the description again again betterhelp thank you for sponsoring this episode and if you are watching this see a therapist even if there's nothing wrong in your life there's always value in talking to someone who's not going to judge you that's better health.com ik now back to the tour and then the staircase here this is how you can tell the age really is by the wood not that age is a bad thing in my opinion but you can really feel that this house has some some weight to it and here even in the mill work you have all of these unique carvings which I wish the original owner was alive to actually tell us the meaning behind most of these because they actually are quite faded some of them but just so intricate here and the staircase actually has a landing with a balcony overlooking the great room now so you can get the perspective of how large the great room is from up here you could have a string quartet up here back in the day while your guests are down there dancing there's really uh pretty Endless Possibilities with this place so back in here this is actually now the dining room and I want to take a moment to really look at the details in the mill work so these are actually BS carved in uh at the very top of the mill work and the boar was actually the most ferocious animal in the Roman Pantheon symbolic of hard hunt the boar was a very hard animal to get so here in the dining room you have bores all along you also have more sacred geometry Flower of Life right there says symbolic of the fabric of the universe what else here then at the very end again you have have more of that beautiful Limestone with now you can really get close-ups on the Coats of Arms here on the stained glass windows and then here look you even have Isaac it says it feels like we're in a church doesn't it it feels um there's a reverence and a weight to this structure that I hope we're can bang in the camera based off of all that we're we're speaking about with the symbolism I want to note that it definitely appears that people back in the day I hate that term it's kind of very general back in the day but it seems like they were closer with God and God isn't something you really talk about in a home tour on YouTube or on social media in general but just based off of all the symbolism specifically the Flower of Life uh that's everywhere anything pre-war will have those symbols of flower of life so off of the dining room this would be I guess like the little service kitchen so you wouldn't prepare the full meal in here because you have your dumb waiter which again like I mentioned the kitchen is at the very top floor but this is just a service kitchen off of this dining room which is again it has a cathedral like quality cuz then even from here look the coat of arms line up through the windows here over that balcony and I just noticed this this is the double-headed Eagle which is the symbol of the Holy Roman Empire in Germany and don't ask me why I know all this it's like one of my interests just looking up like uh symbols and occult things one of my guilty pleasures is actually really looking into the history of these homes that were touring hence why nowadays I'm only filming homes like this I don't think I could look at another white box unless it's architecturally significant halfway up on the landing check this out this is actually a connector to the service stairwell like we mentioned at the very start of the tour there are two stairwells and this is a connecting door to the main stairwell that runs up the entire length of this house now up on the third floor this entire floor is technically the owner's floor and this would be the owner's bedroom in this Gothic townhouse and your eye goes right back to this far wall that is entire glass here again with more of those painted coat of arms here on the Windows you actually have a nice balance here we're facing north but the bounce off of that brick wall across is giving us a lot of light in the space what else more Coats of Arms and all the plastering here it has a wood fireplace actually look at this I've never seen bricks stacked like that look how pretty that is and it was at this exact moment that the audio cut out for a bit and for my my own personal experience filming in these older homes and from some research freestanding Mason stone structures they tend to actually heavily interfere with wireless transmission and in the owner's bathroom the light was actually out and I was actually showing off some of the original finishes Here original soaking tub original faucets what does all this say about the room no lights no audio as soon as we left audio came back uh this is what I was talking about the start of the video this is an intercom from I'm guessing the80s comment below if you know the exact date but this is FaceTime before FaceTime whereas there's no camera but you can see them they can't see you I love that they have that in here behind Blake off of the owner Suite this is staged as what would be the den or the library and in here you just have this mahogany everywhere on the walls you have the woodwork on the ceiling and just look at the it's just so well done it's so well done even the hinges here are ornate at the far end you've got the water closet here and then wait till you see this so we're actually getting some nice sunlight now so we are facing south so this room gets Sun the entire day here but I want to show you this check this out this is essentially uh a bath house in this Gothic townhouse so you have a sunken deep set tub here even look at the ornateness on the radiator uh you could turn this into a steam I actually see a little uh you see that Blake is that for the dumb waiter or for the uh yeah that's for the dumb waiter so you could have someone cook you a meal send it up in the dumb waiter be sitting in this tub right here getting a a sweat going on it's pretty crazy that they kept this I've never seen a a tub like this in a house another look at that Den here with that woodwork I have to say the agent did a pretty solid job with the staging even look at that they left a pair of products right here they gave it a little bit of a modern touch because it is such a a historic home where you would need again like I mentioned you would have to be such a specific buyer who was obsessed with history to want this place someone like myself if I had the cash woo so now we're going up to the fourth floor and again another look into the second stairwell and actually we have some light now you'll see in a second there's a skylight above us but we're not quite there yet this is technically floor number four which is the guest floor so you have a landing off that stairwell first guest bedroom and just take a peek at this again more of that beautiful mill work more of that beautiful window work and the view out of this window is very important for a specific reason so if you look out that window that is a 17t wide vacant lot in front of us so if there was a home here your sunlight would be blocked but because there isn't a home and I'm guessing it's grandfather's in you have all this sunlight on a northern facing exposure which is super rare and you can see even just from the natural light how bright it is in the space so we were chatting off camera and this home given its age you'd think oh is it sturdy this home is so sturdy that even the closets there's a piece of paneling missing here the closets have brick supporting the closet when I say they don't build homes like this anymore they truly don't and I think it's a combination of cutting costs saving time maybe a lack of patience who knows but that's why I love filming homes like this because they're so wellb built and they're so full of character I mean this this is just a little walk-in closet here back out into the landing get a look at this bathroom so this is the shared bathroom on this floor look how stunning this is look at this like metallic original wallpapering Here original faucet there back when this was built there were no fans so a little uh draft for you if you're doing some serious business in this bathroom into the hallway again we've got a closet right here just for storage nothing too crazy another one of those 1980s FaceTime devices I if I bought this I would keep that just to have that cuz it's so unique and this is the second bedroom here on the fourth floor and the first thing I noticed in this room are these double wide planks below our feet that's another sign to show that this is indeed an original home you can hear those beautiful creaking sounds you've got a water closet separate in the back of the room here and then you have the bathroom off to the side here with that sunlight coming in now we are facing south interestingly enough the radiator is in the shower above it it's kind of unique the thing about a home like this that I love is the person who does buy this is most likely going to keep all the original woodwork the finishings just because that's what gives it its Soul yeah you can modernize it add in and you know central air update the heating but it's really the details in the craftsmanship in my opinion that give it the sole of the house house and speaking of Soul at the very top of the home look at this huge Skylight that is flooding in light down the staircase here so now for the first time because of this Skylight it runs the entire length of the stairwell you can now see into the service stairwell and uh you know back in the day I was thinking you would have to be pretty pretty fit to be serving in this house because this is what six stories and there's no elevator but most likely whoever does buy this would probably rip this out and put in a pretty sizable elevator in this uh stairwell shaft cuz it is pretty large and you could probably put a decent elevator in here but now we are at the top floor where we have once again the mic getting major interference from something in this house and at this point we're at the top so it can't be the stones holding up the house this is actually the dumb waiter I mentioned to bring the food down to the lower levels of the house but again this is the kitchen at the top of the house typically this would be in the lower level in the basement out of sight I'm probably talking about the sunlight coming in I also love the floors with the Terracotta with these little symbols inlaid between them then I believe the backsplash is all original tiling you can see this has all been modernized this is stainless steel here on the countertop then again very out of the usual to have such high ceiling Heights on the top floor let alone it being in the kitchen this is the kind of kitchen you would find in a country home rather than a townhouse in New York City off of the kitchen this is where we have the laundry room all modern appliances countertop space here to do your wash pretty standard business in this room then back out to the hallway this is again the service floor so this is where the staff of the house would live this is a shot of one of the bedrooms here and then in the other one I'll actually jump in give a bit of perspective on the size of the space which in my opinion pretty large room we have a window facing north again getting that bounce off that vacant lot down below us and then heading back into the hallway because this is the staff floor there's only one bathroom but check out this wallpaper look how cool this is this is the complete opposite of that shift towards the millennial gray that you find in a lot of the houses that are built today I mean I just think this is so cool I just think this is so beautiful again having the Flower of Life in the bathroom and in the center of the hallway the ladder to the attic was left down so of course I had to test it out make sure we could hold my weight and as I made my way up to the top the audio magically look at this we do have rooftop access this was a pleasant surprise for us we actually didn't know we could access the rooftop check out the crest on the very top of the house I can't see that I know it's there I saw from the street but now you can get a proper view of the architecture of this Gothic Flemish home that was shipped from Amsterdam to New York City I want you to comment down below what did you think of this tour what do you think of the landmark series series if you have any specific old homes you want me to film with that I hope you're well watching this and I will see you in the next episode
2024-11-10 14:31
