The fourth Largest House in the United States once sat on Long Island, what happened to
it?
Hi Everyone, Ken here, today we are uncovering the lost mega mansion, “Inisfada”.
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Nicholas Brady was born into a wealthy family and only further expanded on that wealth when
he became the Chairman of the Board of the New York Edison Company and the head of the
Edison Electrical Illuminating Company of Brooklyn.
Claims were made that every time a new yorker flipped a light switch, Nicholas made a penny.
While this was certainly an exaggeration, it wasn’t far off from the truth.
He quickly became one of the wealthiest men in the world, and with his fortune, he and
his wife Genevieve set out to build their dream house.
They purchased 300 acres on Long Island and hired architect John Torrey Windrim to design
for them what would become the 4th largest home in the United States.
After 4 long years of construction, the Elizabethan Tudor Revival style estate was finished.
The 87 room mansion demanded a stately presence with 37 unique, artisan chimneys puncturing
the slate-tile roof behind crenelations and gargoyles overlooking gardens designed by
Olmstead.
Upon its completion, the 90,000 square foot estate was named Inisfada, a Gaelic term meaning
“Long Island.”
Becoming the 4th largest house in the United States.
The Bradys were devout Catholics.
Before occupying their dream home, they held a ceremony in a specially designed in-home
chapel where Cardinal Giovanni Bonzano blessed the house.
Now that the house had been blessed, it was time for the Bradys to move-in.
Entering the home below the Port Cochere, you would arrive in the stair hall where antique
European tapestries tastefully accented the grand staircase boasting intricate relief
work on its newel posts, details teasing us of the grandeur to come.
The Great hall soared beyond the human scale with ceilings peaking out at 50 feet above
exposed wood trusses.
Set on the center of the 163 foot long wall, clad in oak paneling, a stone fireplace anchored
the room where hundreds of guests would socialize.
For entertaining in more modest, but still grand fashion, the drawing room was finished
out with floor to ceiling gilded wall panels interrupted by hand fluted pilasters below
a cast-plaster frieze.
The dining room followed this same arrangement of wall panels and pilasters, but instead
of being painted, the old growth wood grain was allowed to shine on the imported 17th
century wood paneling.
As we meander through the house, we will encounter the Long Gallery stretching with sequential
archways below a Jacobean ceiling.
While exploring, we will stumble into the billiards room where the fireplace was inset
below a faux mantle, creating a warm, intimate niche.
No Tudor Revival style house would be complete with out a Gothic Sitting Room featuring built
in display cases and exposed beams on the ceiling.
This theme carried over into the Gothic Bedroom where a four poster bed was cozied up to a
fireplace behind a writing desk.
Each bedroom had it’s own theme, such as what was referred to as the “Chinese Bedroom”
which was furnished with antique Chinese furniture and silk wallpaper.
Nicholas and Genevieve’s suite favored the Spanish Renaissance style with several antique
Spanish pieces integrated into the bedroom’s design.
Separately, Genevieve’s dressing room offered a cozy retreat with its own fireplace.
Perhaps the most stunning of the bedrooms was the room referred to as the Daniel Marot.
It’s wood paneling featured extensive relief work of playful figures delicately parading
about vines and flowers above a baroque mantel.
After Nicholas passed away, Genevieve couldn’t bare to live in the house without her husband,
so, in 1937, she donated the mansion to the New York Province of the Catholic Society
of Jesus to be used as a Jesuit Retreat Center, however, the Jesuits had taken a vow to poverty
and could not be afforded such fine material possessions.
Genevieve held one of the largest private auctions in the United States, accepting over
a reported 12,000 people to the house to bid on her furniture.
She had the finest items neatly catalogued to advertise the auction with everything from
centuries old European tapestries, to expertly crafted fireplace mantels, to curio cabinets,
tables and chairs, everything had to go.
When it was all said and done and all the furnishings and decorations had been sold,
she donated the money raised in the auction to the same Jesuit Society.
It went on to be used as the Saint Ignatius Retreat House for the next several decades,
then the church decided to sell the property citing astronomical figures for maintaining
and updating the house.
Inisfada was placed on the market, being advertised as a tear-down to developers.
This sent alarm bells ringing in the preservation community, but to no avail, landmark and historical
protections were not granted and the house sold for 36.5 million dollars to the Hong-Kong
based developers, the Manhasset Bay Group.
On December 5th of that same year, demolition began and lasted for several days until no
trace of the house was left, further erasing the matured gardens to grade for residential
development.
Thankfully, in addition to the furnishings, the in-home Chapel was saved and has been
placed in storage at nearby Fordham University.
Even though the house is no longer standing, we still have these stunning photographs to
recount the tale of its elegant and short lived existence.
Which room was your favorite?
Let me know down below in the comments section.
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