A development a decade in the making on historic Old Westbury property is ready for residents.
Kean Development Co. bought the 160 acres now known as Spring Hill at Old Westbury about a decade ago, director of marketing Nancy Patterson said, when Cynthia and Ogden Mills Phipps sold the property.
The family took down he former Phipps mansion in the 1970s, Patterson said, but kept the land for housing and training racehorses. The new three-acre lake in the southeast corner of the property was a natural depression about the size of the Belmont Park racetrack the Phipps family used, including for their most famous horse, Buckpasser.
The property is now divided into 22 lots, ranging from 4.61 acres to 10.35 acres. Ten of those lots have been sold, including three before the roads and improvements were added to the property, and Patterson said a few of the lots now have homes.
Lot prices range from $2 million to $8.5 million, and Patterson said the look of the lots varies throughout the development.
“Everything’s not the same,” Patterson said. “Down by the lake, you’ve got open parcels, and as you move toward the back, they become more treed. You’ve got completely different looks.”
(Photo courtesy of Peter Edson, Edson Photography)
Though the mansion is gone, some artifacts of the original property remain scattered around the development. Patterson said owner John Kean wanted to keep the ornate gates at the front of the property, but since they were designed to accommodate carriages, they were moved into the grass.
A wall around for the former mansion, now in disrepair, Patterson said, is still on the 9.06-acre lot 15, and the former stables and other small buildings are in the corner of lot 1.
The development is divided between the Roslyn and East Williston school districts, and at least eight of the lots have property in both districts. Patterson said residents with property in both would be able to choose which district to attend.
“To have such a huge, open parcel of land a half mile away from the interstate and half an hour from Manhattan, it’s an amazing, private property,” Patterson said. “It’s an oasis in the middle of Long Island.”
