Sarasota Herald-Tribune
August 12, 2012
A luxury home, which you cannot see from the street and can barely glimpse from Sarasota Bay, is now folding back its security gates and disclosing its secrets for buyers willing to entertain a price tag of nearly $3 million. The waterfront estate, at 3336 Old Oak Drive in Sarasota, sits on two acres and includes 132 feet of stunning bayfront (much of it garden). It is offered by Realtors Kim Ogilvie and Michelle Crabtree of Michael Saunders & Company. Crabtree is one of five heirs to the property as the daughter of a well-known social and civic personality, the late Paulette Vitrier Crabtree Schindler Blair, the last owner of this unusual property. Blair lived on Old Oak Drive for 15 years. … [Paulette Vitrier Crabtree Schindler Blair] taught at St. Martha’s and Incarnation parochial elementary schools, was president of the Junior League (1976-1977), chair of United Way and The Salvation Army Advisory Board, and president of the New College Association, where, 28 years ago, she organized a fundraising luncheon and fashion show on the bayfront under a tent. A “Pique-nique sur la Baie” tradition calls for the guests to wear elaborate hats. When Paulette Blair died at age 75 this past April from cancer, Michelle Crabtree inherited more than 30 big hats, many of them made in Paris.
