Astor Courts: 9 Key Facts About Chelsea's Rhinebeck, NY, Wedding Spot

(July 15) -- Given the 500-person guest list for Chelsea Clinton's impending nuptials to Marc Mezvinsky on July 31, it would suit her well to have her wedding at the Astor mansion in Rhinebeck, N.Y., as rumors predict. The century-old mansion, formally referred to as Astor Courts or Ferncliff Casino, is a quintessentially massive and grand product of the Gilded Age.

As venues go, it would also draw a clear contrast with the backwoods bonanza that Bristol Palin has in mind for her wedding to Levi Johnston (who reportedly will be wearing camo) on some unidentified date this summer.

Below, Surge Desk has compiled the stats and history of Astor Courts.

Why the two names?
Architect Stanford White referred to the building as Astor Courts, but others called it Ferncliff Casino, the latter word meaning "guest lodge," not "gambling establishment." The building was meant to be used as the guest house and sporting pavilion on John Jacob Astor IV's 2,800-acre Ferncliff estate.

Just how big is this former "guest house"?
Sitting on 50 acres along the Hudson River in Rhinebeck, Astor Courts is 40,000 square feet, with five bedrooms and nearly 15-foot ceilings. An enormous main hall, 35 by 60 feet, connects the house's two wings.


What are the amenities like?
For starters, they include a white marble indoor pool built in a Middle Eastern style and an indoor clay tennis court housed under a vaulted glass ceiling. The dining room, which was originally a bedroom, was not wired for electricity, so it is lit only by candles and overlooks the Hudson river, according to The New York Times. The original house was even more posh: It had an outdoor tennis court, two squash courts, and a bowling alley and shooting range in the basement.

How much did it cost?
When it was built in 1904, the price tag was $1 million, or about $24 million in today's dollars. The architect was Stanford White, one of the most preeminent American architects of the era and a favorite of the Manhattan elite. He designed houses for railroad tycoon Henry Villard and businessman Payne Whitney and designed the second incarnation of Madison Square Garden. (White also had a penchant for young girls and reportedly kept a red velvet swing in his house to entertain them on, so to speak. One of those girls was Evelyn Nesbit, who became his mistress when she was 16. In 1906, Nesbit's husband, a millionaire from Pittsburgh, shot and killed White in the rooftop restaurant of Madison Square Garden.)

Who was the lucky original owner?
That would be John Jacob Astor IV, the great-grandson of John Jacob Astor, one of the wealthiest Americans in history with an estimated net worth of $110.1 billion in 2006 dollars, according to Forbes. Astor IV was a businessman and real estate investor who divorced his first wife, Ava, in 1909 and remarried an 18-year-old, Madeleine, two years later when he was 47. Madeleine got pregnant while the couple was traveling, so they hopped on board the Titanic to make the journey back to the United States. Madeleine and her maid survived the sinking, but Astor did not. The Ferncliff estate went to Astor's oldest son, Vincent.

What happened after that?
Vincent leveled the main house in the 1940s and converted Astor Courts into a more residential building. When Vincent died in 1959, his wife, Brooke (of Astor family feuding fame), gave the house to the Catholic Archdiocese of New York, which used it as a convent and nursing home. When the house went back into private hands in the 1980s, the new owners did little to restore it, according to The New York Times.

Who owns Astor Courts now?
Kathleen Hammer and Arthur Seelbinder paid $3.2 million for the house in 2005 and then spent nearly three times that restoring it over four years, according to the Wall Street Journal. Hammer was formerly a producer for Oxygen Media and Seelbinder is a real estate developer.

When the couple bought the house, it was a shell of its former self. "Ceilings had been dropped, a rabbit warren of rooms had been added, walls were painted awful pastels," Hammer told the Times. "There was a hideous green shag rug, horrible linoleum glued down over marble floors and prefab vinyl tub enclosures in two of the bathrooms." They commissioned Stanford White's great-grandson, Sam White, to do the restoration.

Is it for sale?
As a matter of fact, it is. Hammer and Seelbinder listed the house for sale in 2009. It's yours for just $12 million -- a relative bargain, if you consider the history.