Long before the tiny home movement, there was 75½ Bedford Street, a Dutch-style gabled house sandwiched between two other apartment buildings in the heart of Manhattan's West Village. At just 9.5 feet wide and an even slimmer interior, it is considered the narrowest townhouse in New York City.
Despite its slender figure, the red brick building has hosted some major figures over the years, including actors Cary Grant and John Barrymore, anthropologist Margaret Mead and cartoonist William Steig. Poet Edna St. Vincent Millay lived in the house in 1923 and 1924, during which time she wrote the Pulitzer Prize-winning “Ballad of the Harp Weaver,” according to a plaque above the front door.
The quirky house is a celebrity in its own right and is now ready for its next resident. It's back on the market and costs a cool $4.195 million. The annual property tax is $21,190.
“Some people don't want a narrow home,” said Cortnee Glasser of Sotheby's International Realty, the real estate agent, “and others will appreciate its charm and history. They would like a townhouse on one of the most desirable blocks in the West Village for $4.195 million.”
It was built in 1873 and is known as Millay House. It stands between Commerce Street and Morton Street, at the former carriage entrance to neighboring 77 Bedford, Greenwich Village's oldest surviving house. In the 1920s, when Millay and her husband, Eugen Jan Boissevain, a coffee importer, lived there, it underwent several changes, including the addition of a gable roof, Dutch doors, and the creation of a writer's studio with a skylight on the top floor. Wooden casement windows were also installed on each floor.
Measuring approximately 1,000 square feet over three levels, 75½ Bedford features three bedrooms, two full bathrooms, and four wood-burning fireplaces, including one in the second-floor master suite bathroom. There is also a finished basement with sleeping area and laundry room.
A small private garden adjacent to the eat-in kitchen is landscaped with boxwoods and flowering annuals in pots and provides access to a larger garden shared with two neighboring houses. The upper two bedroom floors have balconies.
Dr. Tandra Hammer, an obstetrician and gynecologist, bought the home in 2023 for $3.41 million. Her daughter Donte Calarco lives there almost all year round.
The two are enthusiastic real estate investors. “We love the city and we love remodeling old houses,” said Ms. Calarco, a former actress and part-time real estate agent in Camden, Maine. Dr. Hammer, whose primary residence is in Nashville, uses it primarily as a second home. They now want to buy another house in Lower Manhattan, but only on one level.
“We are ready for our next project,” Ms. Calarco said.
Although the townhouse had been carefully renovated by the previous owners, Ms. Calarco and Dr. Hammer continues to make improvements, such as modernizing the electrical system and replacing cabinets. “We didn’t really do a lot of work, we just took it from there to make it more livable,” Ms. Calarco said.
They were initially drawn to the house's “authentic charm,” she said: “There's so much history — you could feel it.” To this end, some early architectural flourishes remain, such as the beamed ceilings, wide-plank white oak floors, spiral staircase and Dutch doors. Newer finishes can be found in the marble bathrooms and kitchen.
People who walk past the famous Skinny House, part of the Greenwich Village Historic District, also seem to feel it. “They’re outside taking photos,” Ms. Calarco said. “Some people might see that as a negative, but I don't. It's just part of the character and spirit of the neighborhood.”
Andrew Berman, the director of Village Preservation, a group that focuses on architecture in Greenwich Village, East Village and NoHo, would agree. “It’s truly a neighborhood icon,” he said. “It speaks to the quirkiness and charm.”
The interior of the home features an open floor plan. Unsurprisingly, it features plenty of built-in storage and pocket doors to maximize living space. Ceiling heights range from just over seven feet in the basement to about 12 feet up to the third floor skylight. According to Ms. Calarco, there is enough space for queen-sized beds in each bedroom.
“It’s a house with queen beds,” she said. “A king would be a little too difficult to move around with.”