A rock, a river, a tree, a townhouse. Count them all among Maya Angelou’s totems—the last of which hit the market this January for $5.095 million. Now, it’s been reported that the home has sold for about a million under the ask, at $4.08 million.
The poet and civil rights activist, who died in May 2014, made her main home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, where she was an American Studies professor at Wake Forest University, but kept the 20-foot-wide house at 58 West 120th Street, which she called her refuge “not only from the world, but a refuge from my worries, my troubles, my concerns,” for entertaining the likes of Cicely Tyson and Oprah Winfrey.
The five-bedroom, eight-bath home was in disrepair when Angelou purchased it sight unseen in 2002, beginning a gut renovation with the help of M. Anderson Design to restore some of the original details, such as the carved stair banister, decorative oak front door, parlor-level wainscoting and the house’s two fireplaces. She also added a few contemporary touches to the 5,640-square-foot property, such as recessed lighting, two skylights, central air-conditioning and an in-home elevator.
The third-floor master suite includes an oversized library and, as you might expect from the home of one of America’s great literary treasures, the house features a number of built-in bookshelves throughout its four floors. Other amenities include a fourth-floor laundry room, a dumbwaiter, a private garden and soffit ceilings.
The buyer is anonymous, and despite the price drop, the sale sets a record for price-per-square-foot in the neighborhood.
Angelou first came to international acclaim with the 1969 publication of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, the first of her seven autobiographies. In 1993, she recited her poem “On the Pulse of Morning” at the inauguration of President Bill Clinton. She was the first poet to be invited to a presidential inauguration since Robert Frost read at John F. Kennedy’s 1961 swearing-in.
