Real Estate: Contents of ‘Quawksnest’ to be auctioned off in New York
With an asking price of $6.5 million, “Quawksnest,” a Cutchogue bayfront estate, might be just beyond most people’s budget. But you can buy a piece of the estate at a far more affordable price.
More than 200 lots, including furniture and decorations, from Quawksnest, a Dutch Colonial home built by one of Cutchogue’s oldest families, will go up for auction next week at Doyle New York Auctioneers & Appraisers in Manhattan.
“Basically it’s almost the entire contents of the house,” said Doyle representative Louis Webre. “It’s rugs, flatware, art, even copper pots. It’s a great consignment.”
Quawksnest, named after the call of the night herons that lived in the area, was built on New Suffolk Avenue in 1896 by Stuart Hull Moore, whose family owned the home and the nearby Douglas Moore House, home of Cutchogue’s Pulitzer Prize-winning composer. Quawksnest includes five bedrooms, five full and two half-baths, six fireplaces, three dining rooms, and an antique barn later converted to a home theater. The estate remained in the family until the 1970s.
In 2003, Kinkos founder Bradley Krause and his wife, Mary Stuart Miller Krause, a great-grandchild of Stuart Hull Moore, bought the property back for $3.5 million. They hired renowned interior decorator Bunny Williams to oversee the renovations of the house, which needed some modernizing.
“Old houses are nice but sometimes they don’t function,” said Ms. Williams, 2012 chair of the Kips Bay Decorator Show House in Manhattan. “We had to bring the house up to date.”
While the kitchen was enlarged and a new breakfast room was created during the two-year-long renovations, Ms. Williams said she and the Krauses tried to keep “the spirit of the house” intact.
“We didn’t want to do anything to lose the original character of the house,” she said. “Most of the rooms were left intact. We even in some cases worked around old wallpaper.”
Mr. Krause died of cancer in 2007, and Mrs. Krause died two years later while finally living in the home of her childhood.
The property is now under contract, according to the house listing. Information on the buyer and the terms of the sale was not available at presstime.
The Quawksnest auction is scheduled for 10 a.m. March 7. Bidders can participate in the auction in person at Doyle New York, 175 East 87th St., over the phone or online, Mr. Webre said.
Ms. Williams will attend a special showing of the auction contents on March 5 to sign copies of her books. Proceeds from the book signing will go to the Kips Bay Boys and Girls Club, which provides after-school programs for thousands of children.