The Springs home of Edwina von Gal, a prolific East Hampton-based landscape designer known throughout the country, has been listed for $11.5 million. Jenny Landey and Zack Dayton of Sotheby’s International Realty have the listing for the home that appears to be floating over the marsh land on Accabonc Harbor.
Hamilton Smith, a partner of Marcel Breuer, the noted Hungarian-born modernist architect and furniture designer, designed the residence, “which appears to float above the water using exquisite cypress on the exterior and interior,” according to the listing.
Von Gal’s waterfront home consists of two parcels on a private 4.63 acres that sit on a protected estuary. A winding lane goes past woodland, meadows and gardens, as well as a charming cottage to reveal a modernist house overlooking the harbor.
“Take in the 180-degree unobstructed views with large windows throughout framing nature’s brushstrokes,” the description reads. “An expansive waterside deck gracefully reveals astonishing views. The private property is itself a work of art, portraying a four-season romance with the landscape, capturing the undisturbed beauty from the rising sun to the expansive ever-changing sunsets over a boardwalk to the harbor.”
The 3,870-square-foot home offers four bedrooms and four full bathrooms.
Located in the Springs Historic District, it is just doors from the Pollock-Krasner House & Study Center, which shares the same view, which has inspired many artists, including Abstract Expressionist artist Jackson Pollock.
Edwina von Gal’s Work
Edwina von Gal + Co., founded in 1984, focuses on natural and sustainable designs. She has designed for the likes of Calvin Klein, Ina Garten, the art dealer Larry Gagosian, the artist Cindy Sherman, abstract artist and architect Richard Meier and sculptor Richard Serra.
Her work has been published in many major publications and her book Fresh Cuts won the Quill and Trowel award for garden writing in 1998. In 2013, she founded the Perfect Earth Project to promote toxin-free landscapes for the health of people, their pets and the planet.
Edwina von Gal’s Own Garden
Von Gal calls the garden at her home, “Marshouse,” which she pronounces as, Marsh House, because, she told The Garden Conservancy, “my house is literally in a salt marsh, on stilts.”
Since she could not tough the marshland, she put a garden on the upland side of the home. “The garden is a series of ecosytems, with a meadow at either end, which I have been working on since I moved here in 2003,” she said. “It is very much a work in process, but it always will be. It is my place to experiment; to test ideas about growing native plants, creating habitat, and managing biomass before I try them on my clients, or recommend them to others.”
She does not remove any biomass from the property, experimenting with different ways to use them, such as “log walls from invasive trees, Hugelkulture piles, hay stacks of the meadow cuttings, plus lots of composting,” she said.
“After all of that, you can, like me, relax with a visit to the marsh over a small boardwalk that leads out to Accabonac Harbor through a magical hummock.”
[Listing: 964 Springs Fireplace Road, Springs | Brokers: Jenny Landey and Zack Dayton, Sotheby’s International Realty ] GMAP
Email tvecsey@danspapers.com with further comments, questions or tips. Follow Behind The Hedges on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
