‘Even If It Sounded a Little Bit Nutty, It Worked’

“This was actually our first purchase in the city,” Inna Khidekel says of the Tribeca duplex that she and Bert van der Walt bought in early 2022. It’s in an 1881 cast-iron building that had once been a textile factory and had been redone by the Pritzker Prize–winning architect Shigeru Ban in 2019. The couple work in finance and “appreciate good design,” she says, “but we could not possibly do it ourselves; that was not even in the cards.” A friend suggested they meet with Timothy Godbold. They ended up giving him a lot of leeway. “It wasn’t completely blind trust, but we knew he was going in the direction we would love to go,” says van der Walt. “And after a while he came up with ideas — even if it sounded a little bit nutty, it worked.” He chuckles, then adds, “So after a while, you just keep going with him. If it works, it works; let it go.”