After less than a month on the market, late pop rock icon David Bowie’s longtime Manhattan apartment sold for $16.8 million.
Located on the seventh floor of 285 Lafayette Street in the SoHo/Nolita neighborhood in downtown Manhattan, the four-bedroom apartment just outside Washington Square Park was listed last month for the same asking price. This week, the Wall Street Journal reported that a buyer had been found for the 5,000-square-foot apartment. Stuart Moss of Corcoran Group held the listing, representing a trust linked to Bowie’s estate.
Bowie, who died in 2016 at age 69, purchased it for $3.81 million back in 1999 and used it as his home while living in between New York and London. Biographies written both during his life and after his death reported that he could frequently be seen walking around Washington Square Park and popping into local, independent bookstores.
“By all accounts, Bowie loved living in SoHo/Nolita,” Will Brooker wrote in the 2017 book ‘Forever Stardust: David Bowie Across the Universe.’ “He felt at home, semi-anonymous, among New Yorkers too cool to act star-struck at celebrity sightings.”
Along with 5,000 square feet of indoor space, the apartment comes with more than 1,000 square feet of outdoor area — three terraces overlook various parts of SoHo. Inside, it has a 56-foot-long main room, a library, a grand fireplace and a private elevator. The building itself is also an important part of New York history — it was built in the 1800s as a chocolate factory.
Bowie, who was born to working-class London parents right after World War II, saw his music career skyrocket in the 1960s and 1970s with albums like “Space Oddity” and “Starman” as well as his alter ego Ziggy Stardust. He has sold more than 100 million records worldwide and is frequently named one of the most influential artists of the 20th century — everyone from Kanye West to Madonna has named him as an influence on their own music.
