Filmmaker Maggie Fooke lists 12-bedroom Fitzroy home trading as Brooklyn Arts Hotel
EXCLUSIVE
Filmmaker and designer Maggie Fooke (pictured, right) is selling imposing Fitzroy mini-manor, Brooklyn (pictured, top and below).
Ms Fooke owner-occupies 50 George Street as a guest house – Brooklyn Arts Hotel.
Built in 1865 then extended by New York entrepreneur Joseph Levy, the 12-bedroom property in the Gertrude Street design precinct was later used as a boarding house.
Brooklyn retains many original features including tessellated tiles, ceiling roses and fireplaces.
Ms Fooke has decorated the home with 19th century furniture as part of the Brooklyn Arts Hotel fit-out. The boutique inn caters for filmmakers and “lovers of the arts”.
Nelson Alexander’s Arch Staver and David Sanguinedo are quoting between $4.2 million and $4.5 million for Brooklyn, which goes to auction on September 14.
“Brooklyn’ is suitable for conversion to a luxurious family home with scope (subject to council approval) for the creation of a second residence with access to Little Gore Street,” the brokers said.
Retaining the building for hospitality use is also an option.
The location is walking distance to Treasury Gardens and the Melbourne CBD. The Brunswick and Smith street retail strips are also in the area.
Ms Fooke last made news in the property pages by offering Castlemaine’s 160-year old Theatre Royal for sale in 2016, two years after buying it.
Theatre Royal is near a c1923 mansion, Green Gables, which Ms Fooke sold three years ago.
Mr Staver sold Green Gables for Ms Fooke with conjunctional agency Cantwell.
Between 1987 and 1994, Ms Fooke produced Mandalay, a feature length documentary about the gentrification of St Kilda, her one-time home.