It sat and sat on the market, its reputation tarnished by tales of neglect and decay – but finally, the historic Golden Age property has a new owner, and a new future for tourists.
In December, Silicon Valley-based real estate developer and investor Linda S. Lowe and his partner, Dr. Rick Peiser, Harvard University Real Estate Program Manager, completed the purchase of Elm Court, which straddles Lenox and Stockbridge. In the Berkshire Mountains of western Massachusetts.
“I’ve had my eye on it for years,” Lowe told the Post. “But I couldn’t close the deal.”
In the end, Law, Law & Associates principal Lowe struck the right deal — closing on the 90-acre property for $8 million, far less than the $12.5 million Elm Court was asking for when it was restored in 2020. sale. But it seems that the Elm yard, which is said to be destroyed, was not in such a bad condition as it was rumored.
“It’s already 75 percent repaired,” Lowe said. “People thought it would cost $20 or $30 million to fix, but we estimate we’ll spend about $6 million.”
Located less than a mile from downtown Lenox and overlooking the scenic Stockbridge Bowl Reservoir surrounded by nearby mountains, Elm Court was built in 1886 as a summer residence for William Douglas Sloan and his wife Emily Thorne Vanderbilt, the young daughter of Cornelius Vanderbilt. Sloane united two wealthy New York families.
The couple retained top Boston architects Peabody and Stearns and engaged the firm of Frederick Law Olmsted to design 40 acres of formal gardens, highlighted by a pergola surrounding an ornamental pond and a large marble pergola overlooking the tennis courts. A team of 125 people worked in the house and garden.
Eventually, the house was expanded to accommodate more family and friends to about 90 rooms and is believed to be the largest spandrel-style house in the United States. It was also the site of the Elm Court negotiations, known as the Meeting of Allied Officials in 1919, which established the principles of the League of Nations, ratified in Paris in 1920 in the Treaty of Versailles, and which, since its dissolution in 1946, has become part of the United Nations.
By this time the high life of the Berkshire cottages was over, and in 1948 the Vanderbilt-Sloan descendants turned Elm Court into a hotel: the Elm Court Club. This closed after ten years, leaving Elm Court for more than 40 years.
This is when the house is truly a disaster. The fittings were either sold by vandals, stolen, or vandals destroyed them for no apparent reason.
“The kids must have thought there was money on the walls or something,” Lowe joked. “They knocked down almost all the walls. The hills were too high to reach them – we still have beautiful hills.
Almost perfect: “The previous owners spray-painted some of them,” Lowe said. “Thick slippery paint.”
However, Sloan-Vanderbilt’s heirs – the Berle family – took care of the building’s infrastructure and undertook extensive renovations before reopening Elm Court as a wedding venue in 2002. Berles put Elm Court on the market in 2005 for $21.5 million, but it fell through before the property was taken off the market. It eventually sold for $9.8 million in 2012, when it was acquired by developer Front Yard LLC, which brought in Denver-based Travaasa Experience Resorts. Elm Court went back up for sale in 2020 with an asking price of $12.5 million and once again went unsold — amid rumors that it would cost too much to bring the property back to livable condition.
“Only the roof and shingles need work,” Lowe said. “Basically it’s good; sprinklers are installed. Once we gave the outside a good pressure wash, it was great. I thought we had a black fountain – we have a beautiful white marble fountain!
There’s still a lot of work to be done, and while the law doesn’t say what the property will look like, plans point to a resort.
“We are talking to three different resort companies about managing the property,” he said.
Permits are in place for a 60-seat, 112-room restaurant, but Law believes there are too many rooms and the location is too busy. It goes down to about 90.
“I want to add more convenience,” he said. “The basement is all beautiful brick. To honor the horticultural heritage, you can set up a speaker, a cinema and a place for gardening classes. The basement will also house a 15,000 square foot spa.
Much of the original decor can be deduced from photographs, as well as leftover materials such as panels stored in the basement and broken pieces. “We even have the right paint color,” Lowe said.
Law is still negotiating with interior designers and working with graduate students at the Harvard School of Design to restore the formal gardens. “They’re great,” he said, not to mention the former. “There are already 7,500 factories there.”
In the first quarter of 2025, Lowe hopes to welcome guests to the current home of the Vanderbilt Berkshires.
Lowe, who calls himself a manager rather than a landlord, is no stranger to the Berkshires and its Golden Age homes. As a student at Harvard University, a friend invited him to the luxurious 110-acre Blantyre in Lenox, and he said as he walked down the grand staircase, “I’m going to own this place one day.”
“I grew up very poor and penniless. “My friend laughed at the idea,” Lowe said.
In 2016, Lowe bought Blantyre for $4.6 million, renovated it for $5.1 million before reopening it as a member of the luxury Relais & Châteaux, then sold it in 2021 for $15 million. (He declined to confirm sales figures.)
Although Elm Court, now the Vanderbilt Berkshire Estate, turned out to be an easier decision than expected, Lowe was initially hesitant to accept it.
“I have to admit, I was shocked by this property,” Lowe said. “The big players get the easy deals. I’ll take the furry ones. But it turned out not to be very woolly,” he added. “The Berkshires were once home to 73 Gilded Age castles, most of which are now gone. I couldn’t watch it fall.
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