 The late Samuel Mockbee's rendering for Sagaponac House 24
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Welcome to Coco Brown’s Neighborhood
A super-modern ‘starchitecture’ development gathers momentum
By Aurrice Duke
(04/05/2007) Harry J. Brown II, better known as Coco, preferred to be called an artist rather than a developer. Mr. Brown conceived the Houses at Sagaponac, a development of more than 30 houses set on a hundred acres, to embody an approach that, he hoped, would blend art, commerce, and architecture.
 Aurrice Duke
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Mr. Brown asked a friend, the acclaimed architect Richard Meier, to recruit a roster of internationally recognized colleagues to help brand the development. The plan called for the “starchitects” to create reasonably sized single-family houses that were ecologically sensitive and artistically visionary.
The impetus for the project was to reintroduce creativity to a housing market dominated by massive “Hamptons” homes “bereft of architectural forethought,” Mr. Brown told Long Island Business News at the project’s inception, nearly six years ago.
His death from complications of prostate cancer in November of 2005 cast uncertainty on the project.
Al Brown, the new president of the Brown Companies (no relation to Harry Brown), faced mounting taxes as he reassessed the direction of the project and searched for someone to take over the reins.
Enter Reinhardt and O’Brien Contracting of Cutchogue, which had been hired early on to work on two of the houses.
“In the six months that we worked with them, Al decided this was a good place for the project to go,” James O’Brien said. “It was the best way to continue Coco’s dream.”
It took three months for Mr. O’Brien and Richard Reinhardt to find funding and bring Sotheby’s International Real Estate onboard. The Sagaponack Dream House L.L.C. was formed to purchase the Houses at Sagaponac from Mr. Brown’s estate for an estimated $15 million. The land, which had been in foreclosure — and which stands east of Wainscott Harbor Road, north of Montauk Highway — had been snapped up by the late Mr. Brown for $1.6 million in 1994, according to published reports.
The partners in Dream House include Mr. O’Brien and Mr. Reinhardt; Christopher Jeffries of Millennium Partners, a Manhattan luxury real estate development firm, and David T. Hamamoto, a real estate investor and former partner and co-director of the real estate principal investment division at Goldman, Sachs of New York.
“We’re very excited about the project,” said Mr. O’Brien last Thursday. “We have a lot of experience in modern architecture.” His firm is the general contractor for the entire project.
Eight houses have been completed over the past three years, though the project has experienced difficulties since its inception. Critics scoffed at building modern houses on a failed north-of-the-highway subdivision (and some people joked that the name’s intentionally different spelling, “Sagaponac,” was a result of its location in an area that, while indeed on the Southampton side of the town line, had never traditionally been considered part of Sagaponack). And then, once construction began, reliance on overseas building materials slowed production.
But construction is now moving forward apace. The new owners anticipate completing four houses annually.
To help raise its profile, the Houses at Sagaponac is working in collaboration with academic design institutions, including Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, Long Island’s New York Institute of Technology, and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y.
“There is so much untapped potential that was never used,” said Nilay Oza, one of the project’s two on-site architects. “By giving it an academic slant — get interns involved — we will widen the breadth and visibility of the project.”
The Houses at Sagaponac team is pushing what they call “holistic” design, with the development serving as a showcase for green products and innovative design ideas. “We are going after corporations through academia to provide new, alternative materials,” said Mark Jerzosa, an on-site project engineer. “We want to leverage academia, create a lab for new construction materials and systems.”
Since the Houses at Sagaponac saga began, some older names that had signed on to design a house have lost their luster, while some upcoming architects getting involved have gained notoriety, Mr. Oza said.
“We hope to bring in fresh architects to maintain interest in the project and a sense of anticipation,” said Mr. Jerzosa.
The team has reached out to Jacques Herzog, who, along with Pierre de Meuron, designed London’s celebrated Tate Modern museum. (Herzog and de Meuron are also the architects of a new Parrish Art Museum planned for Water Mill.) “We also met with Richard Meier, who was chosen as a spokesperson for the original project,” said Mr. Oza. “He would still love to be part of the project, which is great news.”
A house was recently completed for Stan Allen, the dean of architecture at Princeton University. Mr. Allen’s house features a compact design, dynamic roofline, and horizontal wood cladding. A series of strategically placed windows along the roof floods the interior with light.
Two more houses are scheduled for completion this summer. Two more foundations are scheduled to go into the ground this spring.
“We are going to have finished product, rather than potential project,” said Ed Petrie, an associate broker with Sotheby’s in East Hampton. This will make it possible for potential buyers to see actual houses, rather than just drawings or models.
The association between the Houses at Sagaponac and Sotheby’s seems a natural pairing: The multinational conglomerate has, of course, a strong presence in the art world, through its auction house arm.
“We are approaching this as if we are selling art. We will be able to display [the houses] nationally and internationally,” Mr. Petrie added. “With our art relationship, we are a better fit than any other agency here.”
The project’s Web site is undergoing a major change, as well. Statistics show that 80 percent of homebuyers begin their search on the Internet, but the previous Web site lacked bells-and-whistles details such as square footage, number of baths, and crisp photography. “In this situation, it was especially important to address,” said Billy O’Neil, an agent with Sotheby’s in East Hampton.
Pricing its wares at between $3.5 and $6 million, the team is confident it is offering a unique and well-constructed product. “What we are selling doesn’t exist elsewhere,” said Mr. Petrie.
The houses, said Mr. O’Neil, “are a real alternative to McMansions.”