The Lindenmere: Former Estate of Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos Hits the Market at $4.99 Million.
Formerly owned by the late Filipino President Ferdinand Marcos and his wife, Imelda, this Center Moriches estate is back on the market for $4.99 million. Located at 16 Sedgemere Road, it sits approximately 10 miles west of Westhampton Beach and roughly 70 miles east of Midtown. The property is two towns east of Anna Wintour’s gated estate in Mastic and one town west of East Moriches, where TWA flight 800 crashed into the Atlantic in 1996 following a fuel tank explosion.
The estate encompasses 8.2 acres.
The property, known as Lindenmere, features a new saltwater pool.
Moriches Bay is easily visible from the waterfront pool.
“The whole time I was renovating it, I kept thinking that it was originally built as an estate, and I decided I wanted to keep it that way,” she told Newsday at the time. “It’s the largest estate on the Great South Bay and reminiscent of the glory days of the Roaring ’20s and Gatsby era.”
The Lindenmere boasts 14 bedrooms. The first floor includes a living room with a fireplace and a formal dining room with floor-to-ceiling sliders that open to the bay view. There’s also a chef’s kitchen on this level. Upstairs, there’s a double master suite with a central seating area. Outside, there’s a large wraparound porch, a tennis court, a second house where guests can stay, and an oversized pool house with a bar, a half-bathroom, and glass walls that look out to the bay.
Interior touches include Capiz shell chandeliers in the pagoda-style pool house, which Imelda Marcos designed.
It appears that air holes in a first-floor closet door are gone. The Times reported this was a vestige of Imelda’s troop of bodyguards, who would be armed with large weapons and hide in closets.
The current owner, whom Foglia declined to identify, purchased the Lindenmere two years ago with the intent of restoring the estate to bed-and-breakfast use. (The Lindenmere dates back to the early 1900s and was originally built as a residence, but has also been used as a hotel and a bed and breakfast. Before the Marcos family made their purchase, it was a hotel in the mid-1900s.)
But as reported by Newsday last year, the owner is Janet Davis, who undertook her own renovations — including replacing the roof, installing a new saltwater pool, and renovating 10 of the 17.5 bathrooms.
This listing update marks a price reduction and a brokerage switch. Last year, the property was available for $5.99 million.
Ferdinand and Imelda Marcos bought this Moriches Bay-facing property for an unknown sum in 1981. In 1987, the Filipino government put it on the market for a then-sky-high $4.5 million in an effort to recover Marcos money taken from the Asian nation, according to a 1996 story in the New York Times. After nine years on the market, it sold to a married couple named Jennie and Peter Magaro, who are not the current owners, for the way-below-asking sum of $1.6 million.
Though Ferdinand and Imelda seldom visited this mansion, it’s said that workers would jump hurdles to make them feel at home — especially Imelda. In one instance, they rushed to purchase — then planted — thousands of dollars worth of flowers.
“If she was expected, they would rush through some job to make it look finished,” Jennie Magaro told the Times. “They did want to please her so much.”
Though time has passed and the home has undergone renovations since the Marcos’ tenure, their traces remain.