Legendary rocker Steve Miller toured an extravagant Gilded Age mansion on the Upper West Side, decorated with gargoyles and cherubs on its landmarked facade, sources tell Gimme Shelter exclusively.
The 37½-foot-wide mansion at 3 Riverside Drive is currently available on the market for $12.99 million — an extreme slash from its original $40 million ask in 2012.
Ultimately, after several tours, Miller and his spouse, Janice Ginsburg Miller, decided the 18,000-square-mansion was “too big” a project for them — and passed.
The home features six stories above ground and three below, together with 4 terraces, Corinthian columns, a copper-trimmed roof, a gabled dormer, bay windows, nine gaslit fireplaces — and views of Riverside Park and the Hudson River.
So how come the limestone lair, referred to as the Kleeberg Residence, can’t sell? The answer may lie in its haunted past. The home’s first owner, Maria Kleeberg, a 48-year-old socialite, offed herself one night in 1903 while hosting a feast, based on a report. No one called an ambulance immediately because, in true “Bonfire of the Vanities”-style, they didn’t need to cause a scene.
Since then, the house’s eclectic owners have included a sleep doctor, mining heir William Guggenheim, who rented out rooms to showgirls, and Regina Kislin, the daughter of Sam Kislin, a Ukrainian-born metals trader with business ties to the late Tamir Sapir, Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani and — based on the FBI — Russian organized crime.
The current owners bought the home at auction for $15.8 million in 2017.
The current owners gutted the inside. It’s now a blank shell with no partitions or plumbing, let alone finishes, sources say.
The nine-story French Revival Renaissance home, designed by Charles Pierrepont Henry Gilbert and accomplished in 1898, now features ceiling heights starting from 10 feet high to 24 feet high. “It’s a tremendous house,” a source said. “But someone must do the work and immediately nobody desires to.” The sellers made the choice to start out over after which stopped, the source said.
The home does include approved plans for nine bedrooms, 11 bathrooms and three floors of cellar-level amenities, all by Italian home and yacht architect Achille Salvagni. Details include a half-Olympic-sized marble pool, a gym with a steam and sauna, a half-sized basketball court, a game room, a stadium-style movie show, a roof terrace, radiant heating, an onyx-walled hot tub with a wet bar and, naturally, bulletproof windows.
The co-listing brokers are Ian Slater and Eduardo Martinez, of Compass, and Andrew Azoulay of Bespoke.
