Gold-leaf wallpaper in NYC townhouse ruined by water leak: lawsuit

A Manhattan entrepreneur who spent years painstakingly restoring his Upper East Side mansion claims his hard work was destroyed by a neighbor’s leaky skylight.

Michael Loeb, who bought the four-story, Neo-Grec townhouse at 41 E. 72nd St. in 1998 for $4.1 million, claims the owner of the adjacent townhouse, where Gloria Vanderbilt once spent part of her childhood, has ignored five notices about the leak — forcing him to sue in Manhattan Supreme Court.

The venture capitalist, whose company has invested in a bevy of startups, claims it took more than $180,000 to fix the damage to his historic structure, which was first constructed in 1882 and sits within the Upper East Side Historic District — just steps from Central Park.

Loeb’s quest to bring the mansion to historic accuracy included restoring the brownstone facade, adding a stained glass-enclosed rooftop conservatory in the back, “period accurate artwork, furnishings, fixtures and decorative accessories,” he said in court papers.

But the pièce de résistance was on its walls.

Loeb “went to great lengths to ensure accuracy to the architectural design style” including seeking a modern alternative to bronze powdered wall coverings used to create a brighter space at a time when gas-powered lighting reigned.

To achieve “era-accurate aesthetics” he settled on custom-made gold leaf wallpaper, and searched the world until he found a mother-and-son team in Japan “who carried on a multiple generation vocation of adhering gold to paper” — and bought out their entire inventory.

He then “engaged extremely experienced artisans to print a unique design which required 14 mixed colors upon such gold leaf paper,” according to the litigation.

The home “is routinely featured and toured by museums throughout the world” said Loeb, who noted the water leak began in July 2023 and took six months to fix.

The townhouse next door, which was purchased by an entity called the Pinkhart Trust for $32 million in 2022, was divided into apartments. The owner of the trust, listed as Elliot Levine, could not be reached for comment.