Thank goodness the eighth-floor apartment at 35 West Ninth Street is full of custom built-ins—the new owner will need a lot of shelf space for his sizable book collection.
Jonathan Galassi, publisher and president of Farrar, Straus and Giroux is leaving behind the bookish borough of Brooklyn for this sunny, Greenwich Village co-op.
The publisher and poet sold his breathtakingly beautiful Carroll Gardens townhouse for $2.3 million in February after divorcing from his wife Susan Grace Galassi, a curator at the Frick, at the end of 2011.
Mr. Galassi paid $1.7 million for the two-bedroom bachelor pad, according to city records, listed for $1.75 with Corcoran broker Paula Manikowski.
The apartment, while decorated in a manner befitting its former occupant, Annabel Teal, the young Johnson & Johnson heiress (lavender walls, a custom-made vanity and what appear to customized closets perfect for storing party frocks), is a bright, airy space.
The apartment boasts inlaid herringbone floors, original moldings, a fireplace and a marble-floored bathroom, according to the listing. There’s also an impressive kitchen with lots of high-end appliances and fixtures and a wine cooler (an essential for those hosting literary gatherings).
Not one to wallow in heartbreak, Mr. Galassi has plenty of projects to keep him busy these days. Besides running a huge publishing house, he’s also trustee of Phillips Exeter Academy and a translator of Italian poetry. He just recently published a book of his own poetry.
As for Annabel Teal, the deed shows that she’s moved on to a palatial, family-owned 48th-floor condo in the Trump Tower. No longer on the market, the tiger-carpeted apartment was most recently listed at $24 million.
And if she tires of the Trump Tower, there’s always her mom, Libet Johnson’s place—in one of the Vanderbilt mansions.
kvelsey@observer.com
