A luxury Mayfair property that was built for American industrialists and where Jackie Kennedy spent time is up for sale, with the potential to be returned to a private family home with offices worth up to £55 million ($75.5 million).
The townhouse at 26 Upper Brook Street, between Park Lane and Grosvenor Square, was turned into offices in the 1950s and was most recently the London offices of the Bank of Africa until it relocated last year.
The Grade II Listed Edwardian property, with separate mews house, is now being marketed for £25m.
It was built in 1908-09 for James Monro Coats − the son of American industrialist Sir James Coats and his heiress wife Sarah Auchincloss, the daughter of industrialist and banker John Auchincloss.
James Monro Coats was born at Hammersmith Farm in Newport, Rhode Island, a grand mansion that was one of several childhood homes of Jacqueline Bouvier, the future US first lady. It was the site of the reception for her wedding to John F Kennedy in 1953. Her stepfather was Monro Coats’ cousin, Hugh D Auchincloss.
Both the Coats and Auchincloss families hailed from Paisley in western Scotland. They worked in the textiles industry and moved to America to make their fortunes, entwining their families through marriage and business interests which expanded into banking and oil.
Gilded age
In 1899, James Monro Coats moved to London to oversee the family’s UK interests. He acquired 26 Upper Brook Street, a mansion owned by Sir Ernest Cassel, banker to King Edward VII.
He had the mansion demolished and replaced with the current five-storey mansion, a Vanderbilt style, gilded age Edwardian trophy house with a Portland stone facade, a gable bearing the Auchincloss-Coats family crest and lavish interiors.
James Monro Coats died in London in 1946.
In the summer of 1951, his cousin Hugh sent his two young stepdaughters Jackie, 22, and Lee, 18, to stay at the Mayfair address at the start of a three-month grand tour of Europe. The house was later converted to offices.
It is now expected to gain permission to revert to a single family home with 11,494 square feet of living space, as part of a shift in the make-up of Mayfair from commercial to residential space.
'Outstanding provenance'
Joint selling agents Wetherell and Knight Frank believe the property could be worth up to £55 million if it became a home with offices in the mews property.
The restored house, with a central courtyard, could feature a grand entrance hall with staircase, a lift, library, cinema room and gym.
It has been suggested it could serve as an embassy or ambassador’s residence, with the ambassador’s mansion to the front and diplomatic offices to the rear.
“The provenance of this Mayfair mansion building offering views on to Hyde Park is outstanding,” says Peter Wetherell, founder and chairman of Wetherell.
“When the Auchincloss-Coats family had the house constructed they were at the height of their wealth and were the principal shareholders in both J & P Coats and Standard Oil − then two of the world’s three biggest companies.
