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NEW YORK -- When Sandra Lee moved from Los Angeles to Manhattan, the lifestyle goddess uncovered another profession: organization specialist.
The host of the Food Network's Semi-Homemade Cooking recently relocated from a sprawling, 10,000-square-foot home to a beautiful, sunny, 1,647-square-foot 34th-floor East Side rental. And while the typical New Yorker would gladly give up wearing black for a year if it meant moving into an apartment the size of hers, Lee is still acclimating.
"What I love best about this apartment is it challenged me to be more organized than I already felt I was," says Lee, 39. "There is not one thing I have not figured out when it comes to creating more space."
She swears by products such as Expand-A-Shelf and never met a see-through plastic box she could resist. No wonder she calls The Container Store her favorite place to shop. "They clap when I walk in," she says, laughing.
Her three-bedroom, three-bath 1991 pied-a-terre seduced her with its 17-foot-high ceilings, floor-to-ceiling windows and southern, northern and eastern views.
"I needed lots of light and something that felt airy," says Lee, who also opted for light colors for her walls, carpet and window treatments. "In California, there is so much sun and light all of the time. You can get depressed (here)."
She lived on the West Coast for almost 20 years, but work finally pulled her to New York, where her show is taped and her publisher is located. Before moving, she shot four seasons of shows and wrote three books in a year and a half. Airplanes were her second home.
"I had my life in New York and my life in L.A.," says Lee, whose new cookbook is Semi-Homemade Grilling. "I couldn't do either one as well as I wanted to, so I had to make that choice."
She relocated after splitting with her husband, KB Home CEO Bruce Karatz, but hasn't completely abandoned L.A. For now, she still maintains the huge home but is shopping for a smaller one there. Lee's can't-live-without pieces made the trip with her, such as two crystal chandeliers that hang in her bedroom and over her dining table, a pair of upholstered, high-armed Rose Tarlow benches and an assortment of Barbara Barry furnishings.
Beige is the dominant color in her traditional living room, which features a wall of windows that gives way to an expansive city view, exquisite crown moldings and two oversized sofas. Round end tables balance Barbara Barry lamps and oodles of silver framed photos, and a vertical Ralph Lauren secretary sits in a corner.
Even her closet, a converted bedroom, is outfitted with Barry floor lamps, which are necessary to see Lee's massive collection of clothes and accessories. "I keep everything," she acknowledges. "It's going to come back in style sooner or later, and when it does, I'm going to have it."
The clothes provide a sense of nostalgia, just like her photos. Pictures of her family and her best friend from college, Colleen, whom she talks to three times a day, are clustered in her living room and bedrooms. They provide soothing companionship for Lee, who lives alone except for her dog, Aspen, a 13-year-old American Eskimo.
"New York can be a little abrupt when you move here. My pictures are very comforting. But the city lights also are great company."
Lee spends most of her time at her desk in the media room, which is separated from the living room by French doors. Once a bedroom, the room features a 40-inch Sony plasma flat-screen TV, four paintings of Aspen and a linen-and-wool sofa in green, her favorite color.
"It's intimate and very personal," she says. "I like cozy spaces."
Like her breakfast area, which the former residents used as a pantry, despite a window offering a spectacular city view. Lee removed the doors, had benches made, hung a Hunt Slonem painting and added a Barbara Barry table.
The nook sits right off a surprisingly tiny kitchen outfitted with granite counters, white wooden cabinets and a four-burner GE gas range. "It doesn't matter how big the kitchen is, as long as I have enough space for my ingredients."
Taping two shows a day doesn't leave Lee much desire or need to cook, except on weekends, when she whips up spaghetti and filet-mignon meatballs for friends. The only thing she longs for is a garden and savors spring in nearby Central Park, where wisteria is in bloom.
"This summer I will be finding my country home, because if I don't have a garden, it will not be good," Lee says. "You need a nice garden place just to have some down time and be serene."
Especially for a California girl turned New Yorker.
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