When Sean “Diddy” Combs was arrested on a federal indictment involving sex trafficking earlier this week, many in the Hamptons immediately harkened back to the days of his iconic White Party bashes at East Hampton home.
Celebrities flocked to the waterfront house for the annual party that, for a time, became a rite of summer passage. Decked in white from head to toe, party-goers reveled at the hip-hop mogul’s contemporary-style house overlooking Gardiner’s Bay in the late 1990s and early 2000s — while others jockeyed to get on the list next to Paris Hilton, Mariah Carey, Howard Stern, Leonardo DiCaprio, rocker Tommy Lee and more.
Though there is nothing in the indictment that points to the Hamptons parties, it wasn’t long before rumors swirled about his alleged “freak off” parties having been held in the Hamptons decades ago.
Located on a bluff, just shy of an acre, the two-story house at 40 Hedges Banks Drive sits on a street with quite a few other homes to notable names, including the designer Donna Karan and the actor Hugh Jackman and his estranged wife, the Australian actress Deborra-Lee Furness.
The 4,500-square-foot pad hasn’t changed much since Diddy owned it, except for some interior updating. It still is set up with plenty of room to entertain — the White Party often boasted more than 1,000 guests — both inside and out.
Though the Bad Boy Entertainment founder held onto the property for two decades, he was not in the Hamptons often and moved the annual fete to St. Tropez and Beverly Hills, where he has lived.
The rapper-producer quietly sold the house in 2020 for $4.7 million, nearly doubling the return on his investment. He bought the home in 1998 for $2.45 million from Mori Minoru, an influential building tycoon from Japan.
The four-bedroom, five-and-a-half-bath house changed hands again in November of 2022 for $5.5 million. After an interior refresh, it went back on the market a year later. The asking price was $5,995,000, but property records show it never sold.
The Saunders & Associates listing at the time described the contemporary home as having “a resort-like feel” with outdoor entertaining features and an open floorplan with double-height ceilings and clerestory windows.
Inside the great room features a unique curved wall with a bar and a double-sided fireplace that it shares with the dining room. “Bringing the outside in, pearly white interiors reflect light from the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the manicured grounds and water beyond,” according to the listing.
A glass-walled den/living room overlooks the pool, around which many of the wild parties center around. Picture the music video for the Notorious B.I.G.’s first major hit Juicy, where throngs of people are partying around a pool, which Combs and Bad Boy Entertainment had filmed, incidentally, not far away in Water Mill.
Diddy’s former East Hampton pool overlooks the bay and is complemented by a cabana with a full bathroom and an outdoor shower.
A staircase with a glass railing leads to the second floor, where there is a generously sized primary suite that once was Diddy’s, can be found. It still has a private terrace, a fireplace and a large bathroom, including a tub and a walk-in shower. There is also access to a large upper-level deck with a glass railing and stairs that lead down to the pool.
The home also now offers is a fully finished lower level with a wine cellar, a movie room, a laundry room and another en suite bedroom with a walk-in closet.
Years after the White Party moved, the now jailed rapper-producer’s home was back in the news in the mid-2000s, when a serial trespasser kept showing up there.
In 2012, East Hampton Town police arrested Quamine T. Taylor, then 30, who entered the home, triggering the alarm and prompting a visit from the security company in the early morning hours of April 1. The security guard spoke with Taylor, “who was believed to have permission to be at the residence at the time,” according to a police report at the time. He convinced the guard he was a relative who had permission to be there.
However, when police officers were called back to the scene by the caretaker later that afternoon, they arrested the Queens resident, who was partially dressed and wearing Combs’s bathrobe.
It was not his first time, he had been arrested on similar charges at Combs’ house 11 years earlier.
Taylor pled guilty to criminal trespass in the second degree and was sentenced to 120 days in jail.
Though ordered to stay away from the house and Combs, Taylor was back in the area in 2013.
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