Billionaire Ken Griffin is building a mansion for Mom in Palm Beach. Here's a look at it

Darrell Hofheinz, Palm Beach Daily News
Updated ·4 min read
11

So what do you build when you own the largest ocean-to-lake estate — measuring about 27 mostly vacant acres —in Palm Beach?

If you’re billionaire hedge-fund manager Ken Griffin, you do something nice for your mom. You build her an oceanfront mansion on eight of those acres at 60 Blossom Way.

When it’s completed, the mansion, its separate guesthouse and a utility building will measure, combined, about 44,000 square feet on the north side of the Griffin’s land. The mansion will be a home for his mother, Catherine Gratz Griffin, and offer accommodations for visitors and family members.

Plans approved by the town show the house and guesthouse will stretch about 350 feet along the beach. In all, Griffin estate's total contiguous beachfront measures about 1,400 feet — or a quarter of a mile. He began assembling the estate in 2012 and has spent more than $500 million buying 10 separate properties, according to an analysis of courthouse records and sales data by the Palm Beach Daily News.

The Palm Beach Architectural Commission signed off on the Blossom Way house in July 2022. And exactly a year the panel later approved revisions that would slightly move and expand a utility building on the northwest side of the property.

Griffin last year moved his Citadel hedge-fund and securities empire from Chicago to downtown Miami and paid a recorded $107 million for a waterfront house for his and his family’s use in nearby Coconut Grove.

But Griffin — whose net worth is estimated by Forbes at $34.4 billion — told an audience in Palm Beach this year he still plans to build himself a home on his Palm Beach estate. He also owns two side-by-side commercial buildings on Palm Beach’s Worth Avenue, which include a retail-and-office building he just bought in a personal transaction for a recorded $83 million.

Here’s a quick look at the in-the-works estate Griffin, 54, is building for his mother in Palm Beach.

What will the mansion look like?

A long-and-lean house designed for hedge-fund manager Ken Griffin's mother on the north side of his Billionaires Row estate in Palm Beach won the Architectural Board's approval in June 2022. The estate will occupy about eight of the 27 acres Griffin and his companies own off South Ocean Boulevard.
A long-and-lean house designed for hedge-fund manager Ken Griffin's mother on the north side of his Billionaires Row estate in Palm Beach won the Architectural Board's approval in June 2022. The estate will occupy about eight of the 27 acres Griffin and his companies own off South Ocean Boulevard.

The town-approved plans show the contemporary-style main house's living area will comprise 17,277 square feet. Plans call for two clean-lined, one-story wings to flank a central, two-story glass-fronted family room. It will be the first house to be built from scratch on Griffin’s estate.

A patio will connect the house to its one-story guesthouse — comprising two structures flanking a swimming pool — with 11,535 square feet at the north end of the property. The project also would include a service-and-utility basement area.

Who designed the mansion?

Viewed from the Atlantic Ocean, the main residence at 60 Blossom Way in Palm Beach can be seen at the left and the guest house at the far right. The estate is being built by Citadel investments billionaire Ken Griffin for his mother.
Viewed from the Atlantic Ocean, the main residence at 60 Blossom Way in Palm Beach can be seen at the left and the guest house at the far right. The estate is being built by Citadel investments billionaire Ken Griffin for his mother.

The project's lead architect is Jim Olson of Seattle-based Olson Kundig, who is collaborating with the architect of record, Daniel Kahan of Smith and Moore Architects in West Palm Beach. The landscaping plan is by Stoev Design Group of Sausalito, Califa.

What has Griffin said about the project?

Dr. Conor Delaney and Ken Griffin talk to Kathryn Vecellio during the Palm Beach Civic Association luncheon at the Four Seasons Resort Palm Beach Dec. 9, 2021.
Dr. Conor Delaney and Ken Griffin talk to Kathryn Vecellio during the Palm Beach Civic Association luncheon at the Four Seasons Resort Palm Beach Dec. 9, 2021.

During a talk last spring in Palm Beach at The Society of the Four Arts, the sometimes-tightlipped Griffin was surprisingly forthcoming about his plans for his residential property across town.

He pointed to his mother sitting in the audience, mentioned the house he was building her and said he and she “will be neighbors I hope for years to come,” Griffin said. “And I will have a home built next to my mom at some point in the next couple of years. But right here, right now — Mom's home comes first,” said Griffin, earning a round of applause.

He said he would love to retire someday in Palm Beach but hasn’t set a year for that milestone. “It's always 20 years out,” said Griffin, a native Floridian who has strong ties to Palm Beach County and graduated from Boca Raton High School.

Although Griffin had earned the town's approval to build a mansion for himself on the property several years ago, he pulled the plug on that project in 2018 after months of construction.

Where is Griffin’s Palm Beach land?

On Billionaires Row in Palm Beach, construction machinery can be see at the far end of a lot at that once housed a mansion at 60 Blossom Way, part of investments billionaire's Ken Griffin mostly vacant ocean-to-lake estate. Griffin is building a house for his mother and guests at the far end. Griffin also owns the grassy area in the foreground at 1265 S. Ocean Blvd. and has said he will one day build himself a retirement home there.

The Griffin estate is about a half-mile south of former President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Cub on the stretch of South Ocean Boulevard dubbed by locals as “Billionaire's Row.”

How did Griffin assemble the property for his mother's mansion?

In September 2019, a company controlled by billionaire Ken Griffin paid a recorded $99.13 million for this since-demolished mansion at 60 Blossom Way in Palm Beach. The purchase squared off the oceanfront portion of the his estate. The land where this house once stood is now being for part of a mansion and guesthouse Griffin is building for his mother.

The mansion and its grounds will occupy land formerly home to three houses bought for a grand total of $134.63 million in 2015, 2018 and 2019: Griffin paid a recorded $20.25 million for 10 Blossom Way; $15.25 million for 70 Blossom Way; and $99.13 million for 60 Blossom Way. Squaring off the parcel for his mother’s house is a swath of vacant land carved from part of Griffin's estate at 1265 S. Ocean Blvd.

*

To see more photos and renderings of the mansion Ken Griffin is building for his mother in Palm Beach, click on the gallery at the top of this page.

*

Darrell Hofheinz is a USA TODAY Network of Florida journalist who writes about Palm Beach real estate in his weekly “Beyond the Hedges” column. He welcomes tips about real estate news on the island. Email dhofheinz@pbdailynews.com, call 561-820-3831 or tweet @PBDN_Hofheinz. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Daily News: Take a look at the Palm Beach mansion Ken Griffin is building for Mom