- A cohort of ultra-wealthy people have increasingly sought to install the courtyard by putting greens during quarantine, Beth DeCarbo of the Wall Street Journal reported.
- It is not the only external service they have eyes on: closed walls and extended external spaces are also in great demand in the middle of the block.
- When it comes to interiors, the wealthy are making room for “double” treatment, expanding pantries and laundries for more space.
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Quarantine seems green for the ultra rich.
Some practiced backswing directly from their backyard and had vegetables installed at home on their properties, Beth DeCarbo of the Wall Street Journal reported. Paul Johnson, owner of the Mid-Atlantic Tour Greens, which installs the courtyard by putting greens in the northeast, told DeCarbo that investigations increased from eight or nine per week to 15 per day when the pandemic first hit .
“The cycle was madness,” he said. “We didn’t waste a day at work. It was like a switch operated.”
The typical green yard costs $ 30,000, Johnson told DeCarbo, twice what it did in 2017 because customers are increasingly meeting requests. He said he built greens that exceed 12,000 square feet at $ 15 to $ 25 per square foot.
But putting vegetables isn’t the only outdoor luxury that the ultra-wealthy are bringing to life during the quarantine. Americans have focused more than ever on their overall living spaces, according to Mark Ellwood for Business Insider. The wealthy are prioritizing outdoor expansion, treating gardens and terraces as an extra room, particularly in urban areas such as New York City. They are also trying to bring the interior indoors in the form of living walls and vertical gardens.
When it comes to interiors, “practical design promises to be a new hallmark of luxury,” wrote Ellwood. This is popping up in forward-looking design plans for expanded storage space.
Consider the additional double pantry of the Brooklyn-based architect and interior architect Adam Meshberg, added to a lawyer’s home in case the owner has to cook at home again for a long period of time.
Service rooms are also becoming a new luxury as the wealthy try to turn them into lavish laundry rooms. Texan designer Melissa Morgan told Ellwood that she helped a couple do just that: the couple sent the housekeeper full-fledged for self-quarantine and started managing their underwear for the first time.
