Called a good neighbor, Schwartz compound said to blend in with Surfside
DEVELOPMENTS
BY PETER B. BRACE INDEPENDENT WRITER
Canadian mogul Gerald W. Schwartz is building a low-impact family compound at the corner of Surfside Road and Nonantum Avenue that pleased the Historic District Commission with non-intrusive buildings.

When Schwartz purchased 17 Nonantum Ave. for $18.5 million in April 2006, it included 7.25 acres of land and a stately summer cottage built in the 1920s and called Sandhill. The 65-year-old Schwartz then purchased 13 Nonantum Ave. with .14 of an acre, 11 Nonantum Ave. with 1.4 acres, 160 Surfside Road with 2.04 acres, 3 1/2 Poplar St. on .12 of an acre and the .61 of an acre at 3 Western Ave.

On these six lots totaling around 11.5 acres, Schwartz is rearranging and moving buildings, and building a new main house, garage, gatehouse, a cottage, studio, guesthouse, gym and tennis court.

Canadian-born Schwartz, chairman and chief executive of Toronto-based Onex Corporation, got his start at Wall Street firms that included Bear Stearns, and later founded CanWest Capital Corp. with Winnipeg tax lawyer Izzy Asper in 1977, according to thecanadianencyclopedia. com/.

It will take two years to fill the six lots of Gerald W. Schwartz's family compound, bottom graphic. Schwartz is starting from scratch for the configuration of his buildings shown in the graphic below. He plans to relocate of the original main house to the northeast corner of his property, build a new main house in the southeast corner of his land, a guesthouse just to the northwest and a studio next to that, all overlooking the beach. In the center of the lot closer to Surfside Road will be an elongated cottage and small gym just below that towards the beach. The garage will be at the corner of Surfside Road and Nonantum Avenue with the gatehouse parallel to Nonantum Avenue and a garage above that, perpendicular to that road.

Leaving CanWest in 1983, Schwartz founded his Toronto-based investment management company, Onex, a multibillion dollar conglomerate of more than 100,000 employees aimed at buying poorly managed but high-profile brand name companies and making them soar. Onex holdings include movie theaters, plane fuselage manufacturers, Beatrice Foods, Inc., Sky Chefs, Inc., and railroad and auto parts companies. Schwartz took Onex public in 1987. According to the Scotiabank Web site, which lists Schwartz as a member of its board of directors, he was inducted into the Canadian Business Hall of Fame in 2004 and was appointed as an Officer of the Order of Canada in 2005.

The work on Schwartz's compound began earlier this summer when most of the lots were brush cut and graded down to bare soil in preparation for construction and landscaping from the ground up, said Zoning Board of Appeals Administrator Linda Williams, a member of the Historic District Commission, which reviewed and approved Schwartz's project.

"They're moving the [existing] main house and taking it to its own lot further east up toward Nonantum Avenue," she said. "They're then building a main house on roughly the same location as the original main house and building several ancillary buildings that are all fairly low ridge heights; they look like utility buildings."

Williams added that the commission really only had issues with the new main house, the gatehouse and garage, but that overall, the designs of Schwartz's building were so simple that they did not take long to get through the HDC.

"There were very cottagey-looking and they had very simple lines to them," said Williams, who added that Schwartz is moving several smaller buildings off his lots.

Although Williams said that both her office and the HDC continues to field calls from islanders and visitors inquiring about the sudden change to a part of Surfside that, untouched for decades, is now abuzz with activity, Surfside Association Member Maureen Beck said that Schwartz has made every effort to blend his project in with the vernacular of Surfside and reduce the impact of the project as it continues, probably through to 2009.

"His general contractor has been very good on alerting us about their progress," said Beck. "When the winds were so high in May and June, they immediately put up fencing when they were doing all that excavation.

"They have very efficient systems for moving the houses at the same time that they're getting their cellars ready and the whole plan for the estate."

Beck said that Schwartz is hoping to have a few residences ready by next year. When completed in 2009, the property should be as low impact as possible, with none of its buildings taller than one story and walking paths among meadows, wildflowers, perennial gardens, flowering meadows and lawns.

"That's exactly along the lines of what the Surfside Area Plan is trying to extend throughout Surfside," said Beck. "That's been the frustration of the people in Surfside - the buildings that are blocking the view of the ocean, but most people are taking that into consideration when drawing up their plans."

Schwartz seems to be doing just that, according to Beck.

"They even sent a membership in to the Surfside Association with a donation with good wishes; they're very determined, I think, to be good neighbors,"

she said. I