Back in 2019, socialite and philanthropist Aileen Getty put her marvelous architectural statement in Malibu up for sale for $12 million. It took two years for the property to find a buyer, but when it did it sold for $16 million, a decent amount over ask.

The postmodern farmhouse was something of a cypher at the time of the sale; its exterior was flat gray, with only windows to indicate its personality. Inside, of course, it burst into life, and softened considerably, managing to suggest both the monastic and the poetic simultaneously. A neat trick.

So a certain curiosity presaged a gander at Getty’s Manhattan pad, which popped up for sale on the open market this summer with a $25 million price tag. Some similarities do emerge between the residences, but the right-brained whimsy in such full flower in the townhouse only bubbles beneath the surface of the Malibu home.

The 20-foot-wide townhouse contains five bedrooms and ten baths, and features a red brick façade with Italianate details. It has been landmarked since 1969, and saw a stem-to-stern restoration in the last decade. Getty purchased it in 2019; post-restoration, it had been listed for sale for $19.6 million.