Repaid 88 Times Over

Manhattan’s last free-standing residence is for sale:

A cosmetic surgeon seeking a comfortable space for his patients to convalesce, a national foundation looking to relocate its headquarters, and a house-hunting Modern artist are among the prospective owners of the marble mansion on Riverside Drive at 107th Street.

The free-standing landmark, purchased by a Columbia University law professor for $325,000 in 1979, is on the market for $29 million. If it goes for that asking price, which was recently reduced from $31 million, the townhouse will be far-and-away Manhattan’s most expensive residence to be sold above 96th Street, real estate brokers say.

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The Schinasi mansion, as it is still known, is one of Manhattan’s few remaining non-attached homes, architectural historians say. While the building’s exterior is French Renaissance in style, the interior reflects European and Oriental influences. It boasts wood and plaster wall and door embellishments, stained-glass windows, marble mosaics, and ceiling carvings and murals. One recurring design element is the pineapple, a symbol of hospitality for centuries. Pineapple ornaments adorn the banister of the grand, five-foot-wide sculpted oak staircase, the molding in the front parlor room, and the metal hearth of the ground-floor fireplace.

“It is a rare survivor on Riverside Drive, which was once built up with mansions and townhouses,” an architectural historian, Charles Lockwood, said. “What’s ironic is that these grand houses lasted only a generation, and then they were down.” Mr. Lockwood, the author of “Bricks and Brownstone,” a book about New York City townhouses, said these turn-of-the-century homes, started being demolished in the 1910s and 1920s. They were supplanted by larger, multi-family apartment buildings that are now staples of Riverside Drive.

There are 12 bedrooms, eight bathrooms, five kitchens, a light-infused fourth-floor studio apartment, a 3,500 square-foot garden, and even a closed-off tunnel that provided the Schinasi family access to Riverside Park across the street.

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The 12,000-square-foot home on Riverside Drive retains most of its original details, in addition to more recent accents like frosted-glass interior doors, marquis lights around the bathroom mirror, a ping-pong table, and a framed poster celebrating the rapper Eminem.