Famed Morning Star estate sold to international buyer

An international businessman has snapped up Mount Eliza’s famed Morning Star estate, about three months after it hit the market for $40m.

The mystery man with “property interests around the world” fought off competition from across the globe to snare the “Downton Abbey … of Australia”, which has hosted film shoots and rock concerts, selling agent Michael Keating said.

The Michael Keating International director said he received “literally hundreds” of inquiries from would-be buyers, including expats and investors based in the US, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, the UK, France and Australia.

Keating could not disclose 2 Sunnyside Road’s sale price after signing confidentiality agreements. But the Herald Sun understands it was in the vicinity of the eight-figure asking price.

The prized seaside property attracted interest from across the world.

Judy Barrett revived Morning Star from a derelict state.

His lips were also sealed when it came to the buyer, except to say he “knows first-class real estate when he sees it” and intended to make the seaside gem “a property for his family in the future”.

“It is likely the property will be very, very much loved, and rightly so,” Keating said.

“There is nothing else like it in Australia. You’ve got 157 acres (63ha) with beach frontage, less than an hour from a capital city that’s soon to be Australia’s largest. It’s a no-brainer.”

Keating said it was too early to say whether the new owner would keep the landmark running as a hospitality and events venture, as owner of more than two decades Judy Barrett had.

The property features an 1860s mansion built for an ultra-wealthy Londoner.

2012 flick Kath & Kimderella was filmed at the property.

Ultra-wealthy Londoner Francis Gillett established the sprawling estate in the 1860s as a “summer palace” and the property hasn’t been subdivided since, making it one of the Mornington Peninsula’s largest individual landholdings.

It includes an original five-bedroom mansion and a 12ha vineyard that reputedly contains grapes brought over from France by Franciscan friars, who ran the estate as the Morning Star Boys’ Home in the 1930s.

Barrett turned the property into a 20-room hotel, a wedding venue, a restaurant, and a function and conference facility, nestled among gardens comprising 75,000 rose bushes and a helipad.

Franciscan friars are said to have brought over the oldest vines from France.

The property features a helipad.

She almost sold the package to a Chinese developer for $36.2m three years ago. But that deal fell through, likely saving the piece of peninsula history from being bulldozed.

Morning Star also has pop culture credibility, having hosted INXS and Jimmy Barnes gigs, plus the first ‘A Day on the Green’ festival in 2001, and featured in films Kath and Kimderella and Partisan.

Keating said the fact the property spent most of its time on the market during Melbourne’s strict COVID-19 lockdown didn’t hamper the deal, with the pandemic instead boosting buyer interest by “making Aussies overseas realise just how wonderful a place they’ve got at home”.

The buyer is an international businessman.

The property also features a hotel, restaurant, and conference and events facilities.

“Thankfully the properties we handle (are) not ones you would necessarily need to come and see,” he said.

“You know you’re buying the location, you’re buying a first-class property.”

This article from the Herald Sun originally appeared as “Morning Star estate, Mount Eliza, sells after attracting global interest”.