A secret garden shared by just 22 homeowners in the West Village is getting a new member to its club.
A historic home at 188 Sullivan, next door to billionaire and bestselling author Ray Dalio — founder and co-chief investment officer of the world’s largest hedge fund, Bridgewater Associates — is now in contract.
It was last asking $7.99 million, down from its original ask of $8.95 million last April — and neighbors in the MacDougal-Sullivan Gardens are buzzing about the identity of the mystery buyer.
The landmarked, 1850-built Greek Revival townhouse is 22½ feet wide and sports 5,075 square feet.
It has only had two buyers in the last 100 years.
Sources told Gimme that Dalio expressed “serious interest” in purchasing the home and doubling his investment on the block, but in the end never pulled the trigger.
Listing broker Jeremy V. Stein, of Sotheby’s, confirms only that the buyer is not someone who already owns in the garden (existing owners in the community have the right of first refusal). Instead, he says, the future owners are a “lovely” New York family.
The 22 colorfully painted row houses make up the landmarked MacDougal-Sullivan Gardens, which is filled with mature maple and sycamore trees, along with an English style hedgerow and manicured flower beds.
Past and present residents have included artist Francesco Clemente and his wife Alba, and John Hammond Jr., the blues musician whose father, John Hammond Sr., was an early discoverer of Billie Holiday, Aretha Franklin, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen.
After Edgard Varèse, the French-born American composer, bought No. 188 in 1923, it became a salon attracting world class artists and musicians from the US and Europe — like artist Marcel Duchamp, jazz musician Dizzy Gillespie and his sculptor friend Alexander Calder.
Varèse’s protégé, Chou Wen-chung — the Chinese-born American composer, teacher and cultural ambassador — owned the home for more than 50 years until his death, at age 96 in 2019, having moved in shortly after Varèse died in 1965.
He kept a portrait of Varèse “scowling down from a wall,” noted his New York Times obit, adding that the house was filled with antiques, musical instruments from around the world and framed samples of his own calligraphy.
The house is currently divided into apartments but if restored to single-family mansion status, the home could become a five-bedroom with “possible potential for expansion.”
Either way, it needs a “full renovation, so bring your architect,” the listing notes.
