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Description
STONEWALL FARM, WESTCHESTER COUNTY’S LARGEST EQUESTRIAN ESTATE ON A REMARKABLE 740 CONTIGUOUS ACRES
ONCE IN A LIFETIME TROPHY OFFERING
Situated on 740 contiguous acres, the estate is the largest privately owned property in Westchester County. Dedicated to raising championship Thoroughbred racehorses, the land has been scrupulously preserved and enhanced by its current owners over the last 40 years. Their passion for racing shows in the estate’s superbly maintained grounds and world-class equestrian facilities, which include a turf racetrack, riding trails, a 40-stall yearling barn and two 24-stall broodmare barns, round pens, and 4board-fenced paddocks and pastures with run-in sheds. The result is an equestrian estate of the highest caliber.
A THOROUGHBRED ESTABLISHMENT
Yearlings, colts, and fillies graze in fields reminiscent of the pastoral landscapes of Lexington and Versailles in Kentucky’s bluegrass country. A network of private roads and paved trails links the 40-stall yearling barn and two 24-stall broodmare barns with professional racing facilities, barns and paddocks, agricultural land, the working cattle farm, staff quarters, and the owner’s compound. There are hayfields and pasture, ponds, apple orchards, and outbuildings, including several garages, and an original stone spring house taps the aquifer, supplying hundreds of gallons of water a day. The estate’s auxiliary housing includes eight staff residences, a guest house, and caretaker’s residence.
THE OWNER’S COMPOUND
The Main Residence
Designed in 2004 by New York-based architect Rebecca Rasmussen, the four-story residence has an elegant white clapboard facade and columned balustrade under a roof of slate repurposed from Yale Divinity School in New Haven, Connecticut. That traditional order conceals a classic yet contemporary interior, styled with the signature East-meets-West aesthetic of celebrated British interior designer Kelly Hoppen. The 24,000-square-foot living spaces have been featured in numerous high-profile publications. The rooms have been finished in a neutral palette that evokes a warm, inviting atmosphere, lavished with sumptuous materials and eclectic details.
The living spaces’ fluid layout invites elegant entertaining, whether intimate or on a grand scale. The front hall segues into the rear gardens and the reception areas: The formal dining room connects to the vast gourmet kitchen, with its large center island and breakfast bar, which opens to a fully equipped butler’s pantry. The sunroom has an arched glass ceiling and French doors opening to a beautiful bluestone terrace, ideal for an intimate breakfast or luncheon, inviting a postprandial stroll through the boxwood- and laurel-hedged French gardens to the poolhouse beyond.
The luxurious, two-story library would delight any devoted reader with its abundant natural light and built-in shelves below and above the second-tier balustrade. Saddle-leather tiles accent the floors and fireplace in proper homage to the equestrian lifestyle. The same leather tiles adorn the floors of the adjacent office and the elevator. Nearby is a sunlit salon with fireplace and French doors that lead out to a terrace. The lower level houses a 2,200-bottle wine cellar and tasting room.
There are eight spacious bedrooms and eight full bathrooms. The master suite, on the third floor, is an expansive private sanctuary, Zen-like in its symmetry and tranquility. The vast space has a Japanese-inspired indoor garden and a limestone bathroom with an enormous, stone and wood soaking tub overlooking the front paddock.
The Formal Gardens and Pool Pavilion
The interior flow moves outside to meticulously tended formal grounds designed by notable landscape architect Edmund D. Hollander. The geometric symmetry of French gardens with lavender and boxwood hedges lead to the wisteria-trellised columns of the pergola walkway adjoining the pool pavilion. Beyond lie the Japanese gardens with a koi pond, and the butterfly house. Other grace notes in the landscape are the tranquil pools shaded by weeping willows, an allée of trees, verdant parkland, and natural woodland.
Just beyond the formal gardens is the 4,000-square-foot pavilion-style poolhouse. The centerpiece is the 60-foot-long swimming pool and spa, which is flanked by rows of French doors that fold open to the gardens on one side and paddocks on the other. In addition to the stone fireplace with its inviting lounge area, and two circa-1926 French chandeliers, the poolhouse includes a gym, sauna, changing rooms, and a kitchen. The pool pavilion is flanked by columned pergolas surrounding a beautiful garden courtyard for alfresco events or dining.
A world away from the hustle of the city, yet within an hour from both Manhattan and Belmont Park, this property is undoubtedly the most significant equestrian estate in Westchester and, quite possibly, in the New York tri-state area.