East Hampton Bike Ride or Drive: The Martha Stewart
by Irene Daria
Sights: This ride begins at charming historic sites on East Hampton’s lush town common, takes you past stately East Hampton homes and estates (including infamous Grey Gardens) and to two of East Hampton’s most popular (and beautiful) ocean beaches — Main Beach and Georgica Beach. (The photo above is of Home Sweet Home Museum with Mulford Farm behind it.)
Distance: 10.7 miles roundtrip
Celebs who live on this route: Jon Bon Jovi, Martha Stewart, David Geffen, Steven Spielberg, Beyonce and Jay-Z.
Starting Point: Mulford Farm (10 James Lane). This lovely farmstead from British Colonial times is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is a big deal among history buffs because the house has remained pretty much architecturally intact since 1750. Inside, the house has been furnished as it would have been in the year 1790. Just west of Mulford Farm you will see…
The Home Sweet Home Museum
14 James Lane
A more appropriate name for the Home Sweet Home Museum might be “The Big Oops.” For decades, this charming house (pictured at the beginning of this post) was believed to be the birthplace of composer John Howard Payne and the inspiration for his song “Home Sweet Home,” one of the most famous songs of the 19th Century. The last owners of the house, Gustav and Hannah Buek, bought it in 1907 partly because they loved the story of the home’s place in musical history. In 1927, after Gustav Buek died, East Hampton Village bought the house from Hannah Buek and turned it into a museum. In 2004, the site director of the museum, along with a local historian, investigated the building’s ancestry and found that Payne had never lived there and the house had not inspired the song. (Although Payne did have roots in East Hampton — his grandparents lived here, his mother grew up here, and his father taught at Clinton Academy, which is near the museum.) The museum kept its name because the Bueks had filled it with Home Sweet Home memorabilia and also because it accurately depicts what the house looked like when the Bueks had made it their own home sweet home.
Pantigo Windmill
East Hampton is home to three windmills dating back to colonial times. The Pantigo Windmill was the first one to be built. For a detailed history of the windmill, click here. Gustav Buek purchased the windmill in 1917 and relocated it here to stand behind Home Sweet Home.
Continue a little further down James Lane until you see…
Gardiner Mill Cottage Gallery
36 James Lane
The Gardiner Mill Cottage Gallery and the Gardiner Windmill.
Think summer rentals are a relatively new thing in East Hampton? Think again! This house, which stands at the beginning of the Gardiner Homestead, was a summer rental in the 1880s! The story of this house, and the homestead where it stands, goes back to a man named Lion Gardiner who, in 1639, established the first British settlement in New York State on a small island near the Hamptons. He bought the island from the native Montaukett Indians for a large black dog, some powder and shot, and a few Dutch blankets. He called his settlement the Isle of Wight, and it was eventually renamed Gardiner’s Island. The Island is the longest family owned estate in America and is the only intact piece of real estate in the U.S. that had been part of an original royal grant from the English Crown. (The original royal grant gave Gardiner, and his descendants, the right to own the land forever.)
In 1648, the year East Hampton Village was established, Gardiner also acquired this plot of land. The Gardiner Homestead was one of the 34 plots of land that had lined the original, mile-long East Hampton common — then a wide, muddy street where 17th century farmers used to herd their cows before bringing them to pasture to graze. The Gardiner Mill Cottage Gallery was originally a barn. In the late 1800s, East Hampton began turning into a fashionable summer resort and many landscape painters, drawn by the area’s beautiful scenery and light, began coming out here to paint. The Gardiner descendant who owned the Gardiner Homestead in the late 1800s moved the barn closer to the road, converted it into a house, and began renting it out for the summers. The most well known tenant was the artist Percy Moran, nephew of the Hudson Valley School painter Thomas Moran, who lived on the other side of Town Pond. East Hampton Village has restored the cottage to what it looked like when Moran lived here and it is now an art museum showcasing landscape paintings of East Hampton in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
In 2014, one of Gardiner’s descendants was going to subdivide the land and build homes for his three children. The town of East Hampton convinced him to sell it to them instead so that the land could be preserved and continue to look the way it had in Lion Gardiner’s time.
Gardiner Windmill
This was the second windmill to be constructed in East Hampton. It was completed in 1804 and operated until 1900.
Where Lion Gardiner Lived
Lion Gardiner’s house no longer stands, but you will find this stone marking the site of his house near the windmill at the western end of his property.
Now, walk directly across the street to view Lion Gardiner’s tomb in South End Cemetery.
Where Lion Gardiner Resides now: South End Cemetery
Lion Gardiner’s tomb in South End Cemetery.
Granted, visiting a cemetery is probably not something you want to do on your summer, or weekend, vacation, but this one is worth hopping off your bike for. Lion Gardner is entombed here, in an above-ground sarcophagus, directly across from his homestead. (His feet face where his house once stood.) There is something awe inspiring about seeing Gardiner represented as a knight in full armor in the kind of stone once used to protect royal mummies in Ancient Egypt. According to the Long Island Press, Gardiner’s is one of the oldest graves here, but his tombstone is relatively new, erected in 1886 and designed by James Renwick, Jr., the architect behind St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan and the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C.
Besides Gardiner, many members of the founding families of East Hampton are buried here, as are the 1920s socialites Sara and Gerald Murphy who were the inspiration for Nicole and Dick Driver in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Tender is the Night.
Wondering why there are three wooden steps at the west and east end of the cemetery? They were built to keep the cows out during the days of the original East Hampton common.
This is the next house, and garden, you will pass as you continue on James Lane.
Town Pond
Continue along James Lane, with Town Pond on your right.
Raising livestock was the main livelihood of East Hampton’s original settlers and Town Pond, which lies directly west of the South End Cemetery was constructed as a watering hole for cattle. These days, it is the first sight visitors see when they enter East Hampton. In the summer, kids happily feed the swans and ducks that live here. In the winter, families ice skate here (or they used to when winters were colder) and the pond hosts East Hampton’s tiny, iconic blue-lit Christmas tree.
Soon after the pond, James Lane will end at Ocean Avenue. Turn left, and follow Ocean Avenue until it ends at Main Beach.
Main Beach
104 Ocean Ave.
The food concession area at Main Beach.
This wide, ocean beach has been named one of the most beautiful beaches in the country. If you are driving this route, note that parking here requires a village of East Hampton parking sticker. That sticker is different, and harder to get, than the East Hampton Town Sticker. The beach is accessible, and free, for anyone who comes by foot or by bike. Food and restrooms are available. After you are done at the beach, exit the parking lot and turn right onto the first paved road that you see. There is a sign that tells you not to enter, but this is a public access road to the beach. The road brings you to Sea Spray Cottages.
Sea Spray Cottages
These 13 cottages don’t look like much, but they are beloved by the people who rent them. Wanting to save this site from development, in 1979 the town of East Hampton paid $3.5 million for the cottages, which had been part of a hotel whose main building was destroyed by fire. To recoup its investment, the town rented out the cottages and gave each tenant the right to renew for the following summer. And renew they did. For example, Unit #12 was rented for 27 years by former Beatles manager Peter Brown who, according to the New York Times, spent over $100,000 to improve his cottage.
Then, in 2010, the town wanted to raise more money from the cottages and give other people, some of whom had been on a waiting list for over 20 years, the opportunity to summer here. Much to the chagrin of the tenants, who thought they had their cottages for life, the town auctioned off 3-year leases for the cottages. Of course, the 2010 tenants had the right to bid on their cottages but many, including Brown, did not. Rental rates in 2013 ranged from $34,067 to $108,150, according to the Times, and have increased 3 percent a year. In 2013 the town collected $932,093 in rent. You do the math and you’ll see how much the town earned last year. East Hampton residents, and visitors, reap the benefit of that income since the town continues to preserve more property and makes East Hampton even more beautiful.
Drive, or hop back on your bike and pedal away from Main Beach on Ocean Avenue. Make your first left onto Lily Pond Lane. You are entering one of the most exclusive neighborhoods in East Hampton. Soon, you will reach…
Jon Bon Jovi’s house
6 Lily Pond Lane
The rock star has called this historic house his “favorite place on earth to be.” Called the EC Potter House, it was built by E Clifford Potter, a real estate developer who built many of the first modern apartment buildings on Park Avenue in the early 1900s, as well as the Winter Garden Theater. Locally, Potter was also one of the founders of the Devon Yacht Club. Bon Jovi bought the home, which has lovely grounds and a pool behind it, in 2004, and has been summering here with his wife and four children ever since. Bon Jovi has become a vital part of the community, doing everything from singing in local bars, to launching a rose wine called Hampton Water, to creating and funding a food bank for local families suffering food insecurity during the Covid pandemic.
Martha Stewart’s long-time house
58 Lily Pond Lane
Stewart’s former house is the oldest on Lily Pond Lane. She told Hamptons magazine: "When I bought it, it was also known as the wreck of Lily Pond Lane. It had about 25 rooms, all tiny.” Click here for a glimpse inside the house after Stewart renovated it. She sold the house in the summer of 2021 for $8.4 million.
Continue along Lily Pond Lane. The houses, gardens, and even the driveways, will become more and more beautiful as you go.
A driveway on Lily Pond Lane.
David Geffen’s Oceanfront Compound
199 Lily Pond Lane
David Geffen, who co-founded DreamWorks SKG with Steven Spielberg, used to live next door to Spielberg a little further along our bike/car ride. He traded up to this ocean-front compound in 2016 for $70 million. Geffen also founded several record labels. The self-made billionaire started his career in the mail room of the William Morris talent agency.
Continue along Lily Pond Lane and, soon, you will see Georgica Beach on your left.
Georgia Beach
219 Lily Pond Lane
Georgica Beach on a late spring afternoon.
This is another lovely East Hampton beach. There are no food concessions, but there are lifeguards and restrooms.
Turn left after you exit the Georgica Beach Parking lot. At this point Lily Pond Road becomes Apaquoque Road. After you pass just a few houses, Apaquoque Road will end in a T. The house on your left, on the corner of Apaquoque Road and West End Road, is the infamous Grey Gardens. Turn left onto West End Road for a better view of it.
Grey Gardens
3 West End Road
Grey Gardens today
This house known as “Grey Gardens” was the subject of a documentary, a Broadway musical, and an HBO movie starring Drew Barrymore and Jessica Lange. Why? Because this is where Jackie Kennedy Onassis’s aunt and cousin lived in such deplorable conditions that, in 1971, the Suffolk County Department of Health declared the house unfit for human habitation.
A bit of history: Jackie’s aunt, Edith Ewing Bouvier Beale (known as “Big Edie”) purchased Grey Gardens with her husband in 1924. They divorced in the 1940s and Big Edie’s husband gave her an allowance of $300 a month (worth about $4,000 today) to cover expenses for her, their daughter, Edith “Little Edie” Bouvier Beale, and the house. The money did not go very far and, eventually, the house (along with the Beale’s lives) fell into horrific disrepair.
“Rooms were covered with cat and raccoon feces, there were no working toilet facilities, no working appliances or utilities (the only running water tap was in the kitchen sink), mounds of empty pet food cans and other debris piled four feet high and running 15 feet long in the dining room, upholstery infested with fleas, shattered windows, and a tree growing through the ceiling of Big Edie’s original bedroom,” states GreyGardensOnline.com, a website dedicated to all things Grey Gardens.
“One second-floor bedroom contained human feces. Conditions were the most horrible I have ever seen,” the head of Housing and Sanitation for the Health Department, told GreyGardensOnline.com. To see photos of what the house looked like when the Beales were living there, click here.
The way the Beales were living received international coverage in the press and Jackie O and her sister, Lee Radziwill, gave the Beale’s money to make the house livable again. After Big Edie died in 1977, Little Edie put the house on the market with one stipulation – she would sell it only to someone who promised to restore it. Writer Sally Quinn and her husband, Ben Bradlee, the former executive editor of The Washington Post, made that promise. Click here to see what the place looked like after Quinn and Bradlee restored it. After Bradlee died, Quinn sold the house to its current owner, fashion designer Liz Lange. To see a video of Lange giving a tour of her house and gardens, click here and click here for a few photos.
How Grey Gardens got its name
Before the Beales purchased it, the house had been owned by Anna and Robert C. Hill. Anna loved gardening and “imported magnificent concrete walls from Spain to enclose the garden and temper the fierce winds and sea spray of eastern Long Island,” according GreyGardensOnline.com. She and her landscape designer “planted a variety of pale colored flowers including climbing rose, lavender, phlox, and delphinium. `It was truly a grey garden. `The soft grey of the dunes, cement walls, and sea mists gave us our color scheme as well as our name.’”
Continue along West End Road until you reach a sign that says “private road.” Make a u-turn and bear left at the corner where West End Road turns into Apaquoque Road.
Steven Speilberg’s House
116 Apaquogue Rd
Spielberg calls his house Quelle Farm. He and his family have been summering here for years. You will have a nice view of it further along when we reach Cove Hollow Farm Road.
Turn left onto La Forest Lane. This will end in a T at Georgia Road. Turn left onto Georgica Road and make your second left onto Cove Hollow Farm Road.
Cove Hollow Farm Road
Part of the original farm on Cove Hollow Farm Road
This is one of the prettiest streets in East Hampton, thanks in no small part to the generosity of Steven Spielberg. Across the street from the farm pictured above, you will see water-front, undeveloped land. In 2011, Steven Spielberg donated those 7.46 waterfront acres, which are directly across from his house on Georgica Pond, to the Peconic Land Trust to protect them from development and even from landscaping of any kind. Spielberg’s house is directly across Georgica Pond from here. It’s the house with the silo.
Continue down Cove Hollow Farm Road until it ends at Ruxton Road. Turn right onto Ruxton Road and continue until you reach a cul-de-sac. Drive around it and head back the way you came. Turn left onto Cove Hollow Farm Road and then left onto Georgica Road. Make the first left onto Briar Patch Road. This is very exclusive territory.
Beyonce and Jay-Z’s House
81 Briar Patch Road
The second mailbox from the left belongs to Beyonce and Jay-Z. Don’t let the rustic appearance fool you. Their street is so exclusive that it does not even have a posted name.
This has to be the hardest house in the Hamptons to find. First of all, its address is 81 Briar Patch Road, but it is not really on Briar Patch Road. It is on a turnoff on Briar Patch Road that does not have a name. At least not one that is posted. The only clue that 81 Briar Patch Road is on this road is the assortment of mailboxes just past the road’s turnoff. Turn right onto the road just before the mailboxes. When you get to the end of the road, there is a big gate and security cameras. Behind that gate, lies a gorgeous home called Pond House which, according to StreetEasy.com, Beyonce and Jay-Z purchased in 2017 for $26 million.
The rear view of the house. Photo via luxury builder Jeffrey Cole’s website
Plenty of room to throw a party. Photo via luxury builder Jeffrey Cole’s website
For more photos,, visit StreetEasy.com.
Text and photos by Irene Daria, unless otherwise noted.
That brings us to the end of this drive. To return to East Hampton:
Head back on Briar Patch Road.
Turn right onto Georgica Road.
Turn right onto La Forest Lane.
Turn right onto Apaquogue Road and turn left when the road turns left at the corner of Grey Gardens. Apaquogue Road will turn into Lily Pond Lane.
Turn left onto Ocean Ave.
Turn right onto James Lane.
