Just in time for the new real estate season, a lakefront estate on the South End’s Billionaires Row has landed in the local multiple listing service with a whopper of a price approaching $70 million.
That makes Villa Venezia at 1485 S. Ocean Blvd., priced at $67.5 million, the second-most expensive estate in the Palm Beach Board of Realtors MLS, earning a spot behind an under-construction house on the North End asking $84.5 million. That one is 1071 N. Ocean Blvd., owned by Vahan and Danielle Gureghian.
Both properties are listed by the same broker, Christian Angle of Christian Angle Real Estate.
Completed in 2000, Villa Venezia was the home of the late investment banker Damon Mezzacappa, who was married to Katherine Bryan when he died in April. With architecture inspired by the Doge’s Palace in Venice, it stands on a 2.3-acre lot — irregularly shaped with about 312 feet of water frontage — about a third of a mile south of Southern Boulevard.
“It’s one of the most spectacular homes on the lake,” Angle said Friday, a day after he listed the property, which has a total of seven bedrooms and 22,000 square feet of living space, inside and out.
The house was designed by architect Jeffery Smith of Smith Architectural Group, who worked closely with Mezzacappa and his second wife, the late Elizabeth Mezzacappa, on the design. “I told her we needed to do Venetian, because the site was just asking for it,” Smith said.
He added that once the Mezzacappas saw the design, they were captivated by its detailing and water orientation.
The main house, “garden house” and separate guesthouse feature stenciled Cypress ceilings, Venetian plaster walls, coquina-stone fireplaces and extensive loggias, all creating “a magical estate meant for a true connoisseur,” according to Angle’s sales listing. Bunny Williams handled the interior design.
Pristine
Clive Stuart-Findlay, president of the Palm Beach Board of Realtors, said the attention-grabbing asking price reflects the property’s Billionaire’s Row address, surrounding property values and the amount of waterfront, along with the house’s exceptional detailing and pristine condition.
“There aren’t many trophy properties (for sale in Palm Beach),” Stuart-Findlay said. “This one is truly custom in the true sense of the word — I would call it bespoke. It is a very special property.”
Elizabeth Mezzacappa died 11 years after the house was completed. Her husband was a former vice chairman of Lazard Freres Co.
Rounding out the top three MLS listings is 89 Middle Road, formerly the late John Kluge’s oceanfront estate. It’s been priced at $59 million since it was co-listed in 2011 by Corcoran Group agents Dana Koch and Paulette Koch and Brown Harris Stevens agents Carole Hogan and Carol Digges.