With a whip-smart mind, the gift of gab and unending gumption, broadcast journalist, daytime chat show staple and pop culture icon Barbara Walters brought the art of interview to a probative new level and along the way cultivated a Rolodex jam-packed with the private numbers of some of the world’s most famous, influential and powerful people.
Over her 50-plus years in television, she interviewed a who’s who of Hollywood heavy hitters and political movers and shakers such as Vladimir Putin, Katharine Hepburn, Hugo Chávez, Dolly Parton, Elizabeth Taylor, Taylor Swift, Anwar Sadat, Fidel Castro, and every sitting U.S. president from Richard Nixon to Barak Obama. She also interviewed Joe Biden and Donald Trump, but not while they were president.
Married four times to three men (she married her last husband, real estate developer Merv Adelson, twice!), until her death late last year at 93, Walters lived the last three decades of her extraordinary life in a sprawling co-operative residence within a tony, white-glove apartment house directly across from Central Park along New York’s Fifth Avenue.
The sixth-floor apartment served not only as a private refuge but, as noted by The Wall Street Journal, it was also where she entertained celebrities and heads of state and “courted potential interviewees”. Walters recounted in her 2008 book “Audition: A Memoir” that she met with Monica Lewinsky in the apartment twice before the former White House intern agreed to be interviewed about her dalliances with then-president Bill Clinton.
Little has been changed inside the apartment since her passing and, now for sale with Alexa Lambert of Compass at $19.75 million, the 11-room spread is as bold and cultured as its late owner.
-
Image Credit: Donna Dotan Beyond the private elevator landing and crimson-lacquered foyer with its mirrored wall panels and black-and-white marble floor, rooms are filled with a lifetime of collectible antiques and personal mementos.
-
Image Credit: Donna Dotan The more than 500-square-foot living room showcases herringbone pattern floorboards, a carved marble fireplace and a trio of windows that frame treetop views over Central Park.
-
Image Credit: Donna Dotan In one corner of the living room, a piano has a leafy view.
-
Image Credit: Donna Dotan A silver-leafed ceiling, rose-colored wall coverings and an antique chandelier ensure the dining room is bathed in a soft, flattering light. Full-height jib doors conceal closets for tableware and linens.
-
Image Credit: Evan Joseph Between the living room and foyer, the soignée library fosters elegant intimacy with its gold-leaf ceiling and verre églomisé panel behind a tufted Chesterfield sofa.
-
Image Credit: Donna Dotan No decorative detail has been overlooked; mirrored window jambs cleverly extend views and bounce light throughout the room.
-
Image Credit: Donna Dotan The primary suite incorporates a spacious park-view bedroom with bespoke built-ins and a fireplace, along with a private sitting room, numerous closets, including two huge walk-ins, and two bathrooms.
-
Image Credit: Donna Dotan At the rear of the apartment, an ensuite bedroom converted to a den/glam room brazenly pairs leopard-print carpeting with walls sheathed in mirrors and red lacquer paint.
-
Image Credit: Compass Clothes horses and others who desire copious storage will note there are no fewer than two dozen closets, including a handful of walk-ins. Configured with two just bedrooms, the 5,000-square-foot spread will comfortably accommodate up to four principal bedrooms, plus one or two staff rooms. (One potential bedroom is currently incorporated into the primary suite, and another is outfitted as a den.)
-
Image Credit: Google Designed by Nathan Korn and completed in 1925, the handsome building is nowadays favored by financiers and investors. At its current price, Walters’s unit is a comparative bargain for the building. Back in 2012, parking lot magnate turned former Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt dropped $50 million on an 11th-floor spread that transferred with a guest apartment on a lower level. And though the most recent sale, last month, recorded at $20.5 million, a similarly sized but much more contemporary unit on a lower floor is currently listed at $32 million.