Tasteful friends: NYC co-op of Joan Didion for sale, $7.5M

My sister-in-law.

Real Estate changes hands in an instant.

Beautiful. I'd keep the book shelves.

Can you imagine the conversations over the years there?

[quote]I'd keep the book shelves

Absolutely, R3. All of them.

I like the place more, the more I look at it. The split-level living room with its roughly equal sized upper and lower decks is odd and appealing. How great it would be filled with big sofas, big rugs, and big low tables for books and drinks, and a few low-slung chairs. The entry hall is quite nice, every room really, though the kitchen is intimidatingly big -- enough to inspire a lot of cooking but it really wants a lot of friends there, often.

The view over the red brick gothic St. James church is lovely.

$8000/month maintenance and taxes…ouch

R%: Property taxes are included in the $8000.

R5 ^^^

Huge with nice floors and a great location. Other than that, blah. But that’s a lot.

I guess I’m in the minority, but I don’t like the two-level library/living room combo. A step down living room makes sense. A step UP library does not. And the weird sort of mid-century looking low half wall seems very out of place.

None of the bathrooms are shown they must be very dated or in bad condition.

I wanted to see more of the kitchen and at least one bath.

This is the apartment Didion lived in when Griffin did the documentary on her, and the kitchen didn't look so big. There was a scene of her showing off the soups others had brought over because she often wouldn't eat, so they would bring her soup and she would at least warm that up and eat it.

I wonder who she left her inheritance to? Griffin Dunne perhaps ? They were close

A lot of views of walls - which I find very oppressive and would make me hard pass.

This is a part of town I knew very well and lived nearby (67th & Madison) when I first lived in NYC. Madison is now all fancy boutiques and such, so not a great place to live anymore. Though the park so close by was and is always very nice.

[quote]Madison is now all fancy boutiques and such, so not a great place to live anymore.

Horrible how this once quaint and homespun little street of locally made crafts, farmers' market stalls, farm fresh eggs, the Amish Women's Cooperative selling quilts for $60, thrift shops, and used bookstores with baskets of oranges tabbies in the windows has gone all fancy all of a sudden. No one could ever have guessed a neighborhood like this would go so upscale

[quote]This is the apartment Didion lived in when Griffin did the documentary on her, and the kitchen didn't look so big.

I mentioned the kitchen looked big, but only later looked at the dimensions and saw that I had been duped. The room is 15' x 17', a large NYC kitchen but not nearly as large as it looks in the magical stretch of the listing photo.

[quote]Horrible how this once quaint and homespun little street of locally made crafts, farmers' market stalls, farm fresh eggs, the Amish Women's Cooperative selling quilts for $60, thrift shops, and used bookstores with baskets of oranges tabbies in the windows has gone all fancy all of a sudden. No one could ever have guessed a neighborhood like this would go so upscale

Honey - you clearly don't know this part of town like I do. Nor its recent-ish history.

I first came to know it as far back as the mid 70s and lived there in the early 80s. We in the East 60s part of Madison had two local coffee shops, an excellent hardware store, a Gristede's, an excellent downbeat hamburger joint, several very nice very affordable local restaurants. Many old long established and useful variety of local stores. Actually it was when I lived there in the early 80s that the fancy boutiques began to take over - many of them from places like Paris. It was part of what people called the Eurotrash invasion. Now all those neighborhood "homey" places have gone.

I'm glad I've been able to clarify these points for you.

[quote]I'm glad I've been able to clarify these points for you.

And we're glad for clarifying you're a cunt in the first sentence before your uninteresting tirade.

There is something bleak and 1975 about it... The kitchen is the best part, along with the bookcases..

Firm no on this one...

[quote]And we're glad

[quote]Most of DL

DOUBLE "we'" troll. Wow! That's really something. Not only ignorant but poisonous when corrected.

Not much storage space, though the "staff room" would become that, and the little "den" would doubtless become a junk room, too.

The blank wall views are better than looking in your neighbors' windows. Having St. James close is a plus.

Not seeing a single bathroom is troubling.

[quote]The blank wall views are better than looking in your neighbors' windows.

The ones that don't have the oppressively close blank walls (in fact the roof of a church) have the neighbours' windows (see link)

Looks like if you crane your neck to the left you have a view of Madison, otherwise no views at all.

For $7.5M I think you could easily do better.

It may be pre-war, but it looks post-war.

I read these threads and realize that you are all generally horrible people!

[quote]It may be pre-war, but it looks post-war.

Not really, although it's a bit depressing, the oppressive views or lack of them, it's very solid and high quality.

Fucking hell, R15. You're a Living National Treasure, what with your tales of the Stuyvesants and the Minutes before, you know, what you [italic]au fait[/italic] in-the-know-set call the Eurotrash Invasion. I hope the Smithsonian is in touch with you.

And these coffee shops in the 1970s? Amazing.

R8 Why not an actual library with privacy? There really isn't any place like that in apartment. Sometimes people need to escape their significant others/get work done for a few moments. Why bring the ceiling closer?

It's also kind of awkward getting from the kitchen to the dining room. Hauling dishes and food through the foyer is strange. But I think Joan got all her nutrition through cigarettes and prescription pills.

This is what $7.5 million and $96,000/year in maintenance fees gets you?

NYC is nice enough, I guess, but not that nice.

[quote]Why not an actual library with privacy? There really isn't any place like that in apartment. Sometimes people need to escape their significant others/get work done for a few moments.

Why not have multiple libraries? The "Bedroom" between the "Library/Living Room" and the "Primary Bedroom" is fitted out with bookshelves enough to be a good library. And other rooms have smaller runs of shelving. Doubtful the apartment's next owner/s will put all four rooms shown as bedrooms on the listing floor plan to use as such. A library is where and what you make of it.

R13, excuse me, but what the fuck are you talking about? This is East 71st Street and Madison Avenue, a block away from both the Frick Collection on 70th Street and Fifth Avenue) and Central Park? When was this particular patch of the Upper East Side ever what you describe--1860?

There is a window in every shitter; it’s worth 7.5mm even with that kitchen. If I have these funds, I’ll pay somebody to predigest my food as fancy people must.

Plus, that isn’t a “library”; it’s a stage for me to learn tap and clog dancing.

Because I’m rich enough to do whatever the fuck I want.

Afterwards, I can take a dump in a well-ventilated bathroom.

When I heard she'd died, knowing the apartment, I had it in my head that that it would be sold for around $7 million, which is completely reasonable for its location, its size, its provenance, and its pedigree. I was right.

How nice for you, R30.

And how interesting for all of us here.

Will this congratulations post do for everyone at the DL, or does your need require posts from everyone?

Thanks again for being so right about so much.

If it still smells like Ms. Didion, I wouldn't take it for ten grand.

I can't look at these anymore. The prices are obscene.

Is that all CGI anyway. Even the kitchen appliances?

"Thanks again for being so right about so much."

You're welcome, R31.

And please try to mark that tone of bitterness in your sarcastic delivery. It's a little sad.

[quote]It's also kind of awkward getting from the kitchen to the dining room. Hauling dishes and food through the foyer is strange. But I think Joan got all her nutrition through cigarettes and prescription pills.

That "den" was originally the pantry which lead into the dining room. The current pantry was the servant's hall and the laundry room was a second maid's room with its own door to the skinny bathroom. I imagine that library was a separate room and not raised up those few steps with entry from both the foyer and living room. Dollars to donuts that was the original floorplan. All of the other A line units are different in the kitchen/service wing layouts and they all make more sense than this one, but all that can be fixed.

R28, I was having a laugh at R12's post where he described some idyllic funky neighborhood that existed before the area was spoiled by turning upmarket -- as you say, maybe about 1860.

He explains it all again in R15 by saying there were coffee shops in the neighborhood in the 1970s. (There were coffee shops every fucking place in NYC in the 1970s.)

A lovely reflection of a life well lived.

I knew this high-riding bitch had herringbone floors. I fucking love herringbone floors.

The tile in the kitchen is appalling, though. Maybe it reminded her of terra cotta California?

Everything in this apartment drips taste, as you'd expect from Didion.

I am surprised by the number of windows that abut air shafts or brick walls. You'd think the Didion Dunnes would have moved skyward. Joan really lived alone in a 4BR at the end?

Who is inheriting, since she left no immediate survivors? Is it Griffin?

As for who's inheriting, I assume it's Griffin Dunne and her other nieces (if there were any nieces) and nephews. Her brother had children, I think.

I thought her brother James was still alive but I see he died in 2020.

I don't know if any of the Dunnes will inherit, John Griffin had five siblings and who even knows how many nieces and nephews that adds up to.

At any rate, she mentioned Griffin in Blue Nights as her contact in case of emergency, so he is definitely going to inherit. I assume he was also the executor.

Why is OP grayed and crossed out?

I see an old window unit air conditioner mounted high in the corner wall of one of the rooms, though the listing says the unit has central AC. The unit looks all corroded. I thought these old air conditioner “sleeves” would be sealed over when a building was converted to central air conditioning.

R44: It seems to be the apartment rather the entire building that has central a/c. On the facades, you can see window units and in-wall installed units in a fair number of apartments still. The old a/c unit you note (image 18?) looks like it corresponds to the "Den." There's often a small room or two that isn't easily fitted with central a/c and is left without -- not wanting to ruin the ceiling heights with ductwork everywhere and on the theory that it will be cool enough. Maybe they left an ugly old unit in place in case it was not (or she added it having found the same.)

R34: I'm sure you're right about the two rooms having been joined in the present configuration. The irregular window arrangement suggests the two spaces were not meant to be seen as a single space, and step-down rooms usually stepped down at the edge, not in the middle. The big squared off opening that connects these spaces to the entry hall is wrong too, later in character than the building and the original plan.

Here's apartment 11A (listing details from 2021) the same tier and same plan but 1) less Didion's small "Den" and resulting shifts in the kitchen, and 2) the Living Room/Library are very much separate spaces (with some minor rearranging of the adjacent circulation spaces in Didion's place to reflect the joining of the two spaces as one.

I think I prefer the open space of Didion's apartment, but the one at r46 is very nice. Love their kitchen.

Sold for $5.4M per Architectural Digest.