New York City’s wealthy elite are building elaborate secret panic rooms in their ostentatious mansions amid fears of rising crime in the Big Apple.
The trend of millionaires installing electrified door handles, rooms that shoot pepper spray outward, and ballistic walls to protect them from intruders trying to enter is repeated throughout the United States.
These images show just a few of the ingenious designs integrated into bookshelves, staircases, and fireplaces in fashionable neighborhoods like Park Avenue and the West Village.
It comes as the rich and famous cower in the face of criminals across New York City, which has seen spiraling crime in recent years.
Rigdon’s panic rooms start at $50,000, and it could cost up to $1 million to fortify luxury apartments in New York City.
Comedian Joan Rivers and actress Gwyneth Paltrow have reportedly had panic rooms
New York Magazine reports that Bill Rigdon is the person mega-rich Manhattanites call when they want a closet that locks from the inside with electrified handles.
Rigdon, who also deals in yachts, armored vehicles and art, said he had a client who worked at Fox News and his accessories start at $50,000.
“I once had a Fox News reporter who had a whole plan for a basement bunker where 13 or 14 people could stay for a period of time,” Rigdon said.
Rigdon said his business of building hidden bunkers inside apartments in New York City is booming as more and more wealthy city residents feel the five boroughs are doomed.
Panic room business owner Steve Humble of Creative Home Engineering told the magazine that he saw a marked uptick in business specifically in New York when Black Lives Matter protests erupted across the country in the summer of 2020.
New York City’s wealthy elite are building incredible secret panic rooms in their ostentatious mansions amid fears about rising crime in the Big Apple.
Another example of a panic room, with a bookshelf serving as a means of entry.
“That wave has somewhat subsided, but it was largely replaced by the persistent rise in violent crime in big cities like New York,” Humble said.
While Violent crime decreased noticeably starting in April 2024.According to the NYPD, crime in America’s largest city remains elevated from 2019 lows.
In 2019, New York recorded approximately 95,000 criminal incidents according to the NYPD. In 2023, That number was 126,678.. That’s a 33 percent increase from four years earlier, despite the fact that overall crime is indeed slowly declining.
The NYPD stated in its 2023 report that murders have increased for four consecutive years until last year, when they fell 11 percent to a total of 386.
Still, looking back at 2019, before the pandemic and protests related to the police killing of George Floyd, there were 21 percent fewer murders than in 2023.
A side-by-side image showing the normal wall, on the left, and the opening to the safe room, on the right.
An appraiser named Jonathan Miller, who knows the city’s real estate inside and out, said panic rooms are a fad for the ultra-wealthy.
Panic room providers said they frequently serve celebrities, billionaires, government officials and embassies.
A mirror vault designed by Creative Home Engineering
Other crimes such as rape, robbery, serious assault and grand theft remain significantly higher than four years ago, according to NYPD data.
Amid this objectively more dangerous environment, New Yorkers are “confined,” Humble says.
Panic room providers said they frequently serve celebrities, billionaires, government officials and embassies.
Rigdon couldn’t specifically reveal any of his clients due to confidentiality agreements he signed, but he did drop hints.
His clients include a “famous pianist from England who wears weird glasses” and “a TV presenter who is very famous with a friend called Gayle.”
Rigdon also dropped the bombshell that Jeffrey Epstein’s brother once called him.
Rigdon dropped hints about which celebrities he had as clients, referring to one of them as a “famous pianist from England who wears weird glasses.”
Those in the panic room business say selling them to rich people is as easy as telling them it’s better to be safe than sorry.
Pictured: A panic room designed by Creative Home Engineering, owned by Steve Humble.
Comedian Joan Rivers had a safe room in her Fifth Avenue penthouse to hide from stalkers, The New York Times reported.
Gwyneth Paltrow was also said to have a safe room in her former West Fourth Street apartment, but her spokesperson said she only used it to store clothes.
It’s easy to say that panic rooms are common among an extremely small portion of the city’s population, but given the exorbitant cost (Rigdon’s panic rooms start at $50,000) it’s a little harder to believe that people are actually doing this at a higher rate.
To find out, the magazine spoke with Jonathan Miller, an appraiser based in the city.
“We’ve seen it in internal renovations over the last three or four years,” Miller said. It’s like adding a jacuzzi.’
However, Miller believes it’s a fad, something that really intrigues high-end homeowners. For example, fortifying a luxury apartment in the city could cost 1 million dollars.
The owners of the panic room businesses say that the way they sell this ridiculously expensive addition to the homes of the rich is by convincing them that “better safe than sorry.”