Victorian Flatbush’s other ‘Gone With the Wind’ house near Michelle Williams’ mansion is under renovation

Eye On Real Estat

May 3, 2017 By Lore Croghan Brooklyn Daily Eagle

Actress Michelle Williams, photographed at the Oscars in February, owns a Prospect Park South Historic District mansion. Photo by Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP

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Eminent Victorians.

And we’re not talking about the ground-breaking book of biographies by Lytton Strachey.

In Brooklyn, the most eminent Victorians are houses. Stand-alone houses more than a century old, made of wood shingles or clapboard or sometimes stucco and painted Easter-egg pastels, cherry red, or vibrant shades of blue.

A couple of them look like antebellum mansions straight out of “Gone With the Wind.” Indeed, one of them is nicknamed the “Gone With the Wind” house. More about that in a minute.

Many of the Eminent Victorians have fine porches or terrific turrets, or both.

Some of these homes are big enough to house entire soccer teams.

They’ve got lawns of lush grass, flowerbeds full of posies — and also driveways and garages, which are rarities in so many of the borough’s neighborhoods.

Prospect Park South is prime territory for the Eminent Victorians, though the 10 other mini-neighborhoods that are also part of Victorian Flatbush all have special charms.

Can you name all these neighborhoods? If your answer is no, Mary Kay Gallagher Real Estate’s website has a map that will jog your memory.

But back to the Eminent Victorians.

The most eminent among them, in this day and age, is 1440 Albemarle Road. Academy Award-nominated actress Michelle Williams purchased it through a trust for $2,500,001 in 2015, city Finance Department records indicate.

The Prospect Park South Historic District home was dubbed the “Gone With the Wind” house by Mary Kay Gallagher Real Estate’s Alexandra Reddish.

Williams is doing a historically appropriate renovation of the century-old mansion. And ICYMI, she is building a swimming pool, as we recently reported.

Albemarle Road’s $2.75 million house

Right down the street from Williams’ home, there’s another mansion that also looks like a “Gone With the Wind” house.

This second Tara look-alike is 1305 Albemarle Road, which is also located within the Prospect Park South Historic District.

In late January, Stephen Tanenbaum and Alisa Stratton purchased the house for $2.75 million from Albemarle Holdings Corp., whose president is Iskyo Aronov, Finance Department records indicate.

The entity headed by Aronov had owned the mansion for about a year, having bought it for $900,000 from Harriet Salzarulo in October 2015, Finance Department records show.

The white clapboard jaw-dropper has four 30-foot fluted Ionic columns flanking its front door, mullioned windows that look like giant spider webs and porches all over the place.

It sits on on the corner of Argyle Road.

The eye-catching house drew media attention months before its sale closing.

The seller hired high-profile brokers Ryan Serhant and Rachel Simons of the Bravo TV series “Million Dollar Listing New York” to market 1305 Albemarle Road. Last July, the brokers, who work at Nest Seekers International, revealed on Instagram that they sold the house about two hours after listing it.

Curbed.com was the first to report their news.

A story in Luxury Listings NYC says it appears that Serhant re-listed the house last September. A summary of 1305 Albemarle Road’s listings history on Zillow.com indicates that, too.

By the way, Bravo just announced that Serhant will star in a spin-off TV series called “Sell It Like Serhant.”

An architect bought 1305 Albemarle Road

But back to 1305 Albemarle Road.

The Colonial Revival-style mansion was built in 1905 for George E. Gale. The architect was H.B. Moore.

The late architectural historian Christopher Gray, who wrote the New York Times’ “Streetscapes” column for many years, called 1305 Albemarle Road “the gem of the street.”

It has 22 rooms — including a ballroom, a music room, a billiard room, a library, a wine cellar and 10 bedrooms. There’s a garage, too.

The house was used in the filming of “Reversal of Fortune,” the 1990 film with Jeremy Irons in the Oscar-winning role of Claus von Bülow.

The house is seen in scenes in which his lawyer Alan Dershowitz, played by Ron Silver, preps for a legal appeal of von Bülow’s conviction for the attempted murder of his wife, Sunny.

The new owners of the grand mansion are now in the process of renovating it.

Tanenbaum, an architect whose firm specializes in high-end residential renovations, has experience in fixing up Prospect Park South Historic District homes.

He renovated nearby 114 Westminster Road, a house he and his wife Stratton owned and lived in with their kids. The couple sold the house three days before closing on their purchase of 1305 Albemarle Road.

The $4.25 million house

The Westminster Road house is located on the corner of Albemarle Road, one block away from their new home.

An LLC with Zachary Sturges and Parvin Moyne as members paid $4.25 million for 114 Westminster Road, Finance Department records indicate.

The peaked-roof Colonial Revival-style house was designed by Seth H. Cutting, the president and chief architect of Ascutney Realty Co., and built in 1915.

Three years ago, Tanenbaum allowed Eye on Real Estate to see the interior work at 114 Westminster Road while it was in progress.

At that point in the project, wood floors had been repaired, the kitchen had been remodeled, the living room had been opened up to the sun room and a salvaged, historically appropriate chandelier had been installed in the dining room.