Graham Hill is at it again. The eco-entrepreneur and founder of LifeEdited.com and TreeHugger.com became a guiding light for pared-down living with his 2011 Less Stuff, More Happiness TED Talk, now topping 4 million views, and a 420-square-foot micro-apartment in Manhattan’s SoHo called LifeEdited1 (LE1). It generated headlines, think pieces, and no small amount of both awe and ire not just for its size, but also for its adaptability and functionality.
But he wasn’t done cutting back.
In 2014 he sold it for $790,000 and downsized from that comparably expansive property to an even more reduced-footprint 350-sq.-ft. apartment in the same prewar co-op building at 150 Sullivan St. Dubbed LE2, the second iteration of his micro-living experiment hit the market on Monday, listed with Corcoran at an asking price of $750,000.
“LE1 was amazing, but it was very much a white box, very modernist and clean,” Hill tells Bloomberg. “I liked it, but a lot of the female opinion was that it was a little cold.”
“So with LE2, I wanted to try something with a little more patina, a little more texture,” he says. “Hence, the felt wall, the velvet couch system, the herringbone wood flooring and the marble for the various counters.” Brass and walnut touches complete the luxe and tactile feel.
According to the listing, LE2 is a “prototype for apartments in future LifeEdited buildings,” allowing dwellers to “live a big, happy, smart, green, and simplified life” in reduced square footage that functions like an apartment twice its size.
It can seat 10 for dinner, has adaptable sleeping quarters—the ability to provide additional arrangements for two guests—and was created to be extremely energy-efficient. The custom and standard furnishings throughout come as part of the list-price package.
Hill purchased the dwelling in 2010 for $280,000, completing the gut renovation that features a Hufcor accordion wall to add more privacy, both visual and acoustic.
“We had a moving wall in the first apartment, but you don’t typically get a good acoustic seal,” he says. “These Hufcor accordion walls are great because each foot stores down to 1 inch. It’s very compact, so you have a wall that is 8 to 10 feet and it stores down to 8 to 10 inches in a little pocket in the cabinetry. This gives you a more defined secondary space. When it is used as a guest bedroom, there is that much more privacy.”
The fit-out also includes water-saving Kohler fixtures, a built-in Smeg oven and dishwasher, as well as security and environment monitors and controls from Nest and Blueair. The six-story walkup was built in 1900 and comprises 40 units, plus it has a flexible sublet policy in case Lilliputian-scale living proves too tight a fit.