While visiting friends in the Hamptons, Malibu-based interior designer Michael Lee found himself drawn to the colorful architecture of Sag Harbor, and one building in particular -- an 1865 Second-Empire style house on Main Street.
Originally built as a one-family dwelling by clockmaker Benjamin Hope, the house had suffered through various incarnations over its 150-year history. When Lee found the home, it had been carved into three separate apartments and needed a complete gut and renovation to bring it back to its original grandeur. “It was a dump, but you could walk in and see what it had been,” Lee says.
The restored house is featured in a glossy spread in the March 2008 issue of Architectural Digest. Lee co-owns the town house with his Malibu friends Alex (owner of a private equity firm) and Susan Glasscock (an organic farmer). Lee worked with AML Architecture in Southampton and Manhattan and Palm Beach-based landscaper Mario Nievera. Sag Harbor antiques dealers Michael and Elfi Eicke supplied many of the furnishings.
In a nod to the West Coast roots of the home’s owners, the third floor has been transformed into an informal theater for movie screenings and live performances by musicians and singer-songwriters that Lee and the Glasscocks know.