The Man Who Photographed Obama and Redford Is Now Selling His 144 Year Old New York Home

Some people spend their careers capturing the world. Then they quietly go build something just as beautiful, far from the spotlight.

Jonas Fredwall Karlsson spent over two decades photographing iconic faces and places for Vanity Fair. Obama. Redford. Edmund Hillary. Timbuktu. Ground Zero.

When the camera was down, he went to Sag Harbor, bought a 144-year-old Gothic Victorian, and spent nearly a decade restoring it.

That home just listed for $9.3 million. He paid $3.1 million in 2017. The gap between those two numbers tells you what eight years of real care can do.

The Man Behind This Listing

Karlsson is not a household name, but his work is the kind you have seen without knowing it.

Vanity Fair called him a “visual mastermind.” He photographed then-Senator Barack Obama inside his Capitol Hill office, captured Robert Redford at his Utah estate, and braved big waves to photograph extreme athletes including Sir Edmund Hillary.

This is someone whose eye for light, proportion, and detail is not a casual thing. It is his whole career. Which makes what he did in Sag Harbor make complete sense.

A Gothic Victorian Built in 1882 That Earned Every Upgrade

The house at 37 John Street is not a new build dressed up in old clothes. It is the real thing.

Built in 1882, it sits on nearly half an acre in Sag Harbor Village, shaded by a large oak tree with nearby access to Sag Harbor Cove.

Dramatic turret, multiple gables, deep eaves, oversized windows. The kind of architecture that stopped being built before most of our grandparents were born.

Karlsson bought it in 2017 and spent years restoring it carefully. The current layout runs 2,500 square feet across two levels. Three bedrooms, four full bathrooms, a powder room. Refinished wide-plank white oak floors. A den with built-in bookshelves.

A living room with its original wood-burning fireplace. A bay-windowed dining room. Renovated kitchen with shaker cabinetry, subway tile, and a breakfast nook opening onto a screened-in porch.

Upstairs, the primary suite has a walk-in closet and a marble-tiled bath with a freestanding soaking tub. Outside, a 45-foot by 12-foot heated gunite pool, a gated motor court, and a detached garage.

The listing is held by Erica Grossman of Douglas Elliman and Lori MacGarva of William Raveis, and it comes with approved plans to expand the main home by roughly 1,500 square feet, plus a studio and pool house totaling about 785 square feet.

In Sag Harbor’s Historic District, getting those permits approved takes years. Here they come with the deal.

Why He Is Selling and What the Buyer Steps Into

Karlsson is not leaving because the house failed him. His family moved from the area.

“Maybe in the future I’ll buy something here again,” he said. “That’s very possible.” He plans to spend more time at his Stockholm home and continue visiting New York for work.

What the buyer walks into is something most listings cannot claim: eight years of careful restoration work by someone who does visual detail for a living, a genuinely historic home that was not gutted, and expansion permits already cleared.

This pattern keeps showing up. Creative people invest seriously in a property, life moves them on, and the next buyer inherits the result.

It is exactly what happened when Elisha Cuthbert found a buyer for her LA home after a four-year break from Hollywood, where the story behind the listing mattered as much as the specs.

If you follow stories like this as they happen, there is a WhatsApp channel that covers celebrity real estate and luxury market moves before they hit the wider news cycle. Worth having on your radar.

Why This Matters

This is not just a Sag Harbor listing. It is a window into where that market is right now.

In 2025, Sag Harbor recorded a 46% increase in home closings year-over-year, the highest volume growth of any market on the South Fork, per William Raveis year-end data.

The village has been repositioning from a seasonal destination into a year-round community, and buyers have followed.

The broader Hamptons market backed that with hard numbers. According to Douglas Elliman and Miller Samuel, the Hamptons hit a record median home price of $2.34 million in late 2025, up 25% year-over-year, with closings above $10 million rising 75% compared to the prior year.

Buyers at that level are mostly cash, insulated from rate pressure, and specifically chasing turnkey renovated homes in villages like Sag Harbor.

Historic properties like this one do not cycle back often. After Sag Harbor’s whaling era ended, the village’s development largely froze. The homes that survived from the 19th century in livable condition are not replaceable inventory.

The appetite for properties with a real story keeps showing up. Justin and Hailey Bieber quietly paid $12 million for a Manhattan condo designed like a fortress earlier this year, and distinctiveness drove that decision.

At the rental end, Orlando Bloom’s former Beverly Hills home went to market at $31K a month with his personal design touches still inside, and the story was inseparable from the listing.

Provenance matters. Craft matters. In a market moving this fast, both can justify a number that looks aggressive on paper.

Key Takeaways

• Karlsson bought the home in 2017 for $3.1 million and spent nearly a decade restoring it
• Current asking price is just under $9.3 million, roughly 3x the purchase price
• The 1882 Gothic Victorian sits on nearly half an acre with access to Sag Harbor Cove
• Layout is 2,500 sq ft with 3 bedrooms, 4 full baths, a heated gunite pool, and detached garage
• Listing includes approved plans to add about 1,500 sq ft to the main home plus a studio and pool house
• Listing agents are Erica Grossman of Douglas Elliman and Lori MacGarva of William Raveis
• Karlsson is selling because his family moved from the area; he plans more time in Stockholm
• Buyer identity has not been disclosed; the listing is currently active

If you had the budget, would you buy a restored 1882 Gothic Victorian like this one, or start fresh with something newer? Curious where people land on this. Drop your take in the comments.

Wrapping Up

A photographer who spent 20 years framing the world’s most compelling moments chose to spend his private years restoring a home already over a century old. That is not a coincidence. That is a consistent eye at work.

The $9.3 million ask is the headline. The eight years of careful work behind it is the actual story.

If this kind of story is your thing, Build Like New covers celebrity real estate, luxury market moves, and the human side of big transactions on the regular. Worth bookmarking if you want more than just the price.

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Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only. All details are based on publicly available reports at the time of publication.