Luxury watch retailer James Kennedy joins Toorak's penthouse set
Watch and Lego retailer James Kennedy is set to become neighbours with David Deague after buying the $21 million top-floor penthouse adjacent to one the veteran developer acquired in a newly completed luxury apartment building in prestige Melbourne's Toorak.
Kennedy, who built the Sydney watch business his parents founded in the 1970s into one of the country's highest-profile luxury retail chains and who last month expanded into Lego with a $50 million deal, acquired the second penthouse in the three-floor building.
Kennedy, who declined to comment, joins a string of wealthy downsizers in the 16-apartment Como Toorak building including coffee importer Bluepod Coffee Co director Brian Chaitman and wife Annette, retirees Barry and Estelle Levy, and Alvarez & Marsal senior director in international tax Hang Vo and restaurateur husband Kyle Lam.
Advanced Hair Studio co-founder Bevan Murray and wife Marlene were early purchasers of the now-complete building when they bought a three-bedroom apartment off the plan in 2024.
The purchase by Kennedy and wife Jaimee Belle Kennedy is due to settle next month, in the same month as the neighbouring penthouse bought by David and Kristene Deague.
Agent Sean Cussell, who marketed the Kennedy apartment, declined to comment.
They will bring the total of settlements in the building, with views over Como Park towards the CBD, to six, and about 65 per cent of the building's total value, an anonymous source said.
The project – which Kay & Burton sales agent Matt Davis said was selling at a blended $26,000–$28,000 per-square-metre rate – is battling a slowdown in the top end of a Victorian market.
"A lot of the market is downsizers from the area, or [people] selling bigger homes," Davis said. "A reflection of how that market is tracking is carried into those."
The slowdown is not limited to Melbourne prestige property. On Sydney's northern beaches, celebrity landscaper Jamie Durie listed an eco-friendly mansion with an asking price of $33 million in October and cut it earlier this month to $28 million in response to higher interest rates, effects of the US and Israel-led conflict in Iran, and the federal budget's changes to tax on property investment and start-up companies.
Davis and colleague Nick Kenyon are marketing the project along with Marshall White's Marcus Chiminello and Jack Nicol.
Completion of the project at the end of April increased demand and one buyer made a reservation on a sub-penthouse in the past two weeks, while a first-level apartment received a reservation six weeks ago, Davis said.
The penthouses in the building designed by architect Stephen Jolson include about 500 square metres of living area, in addition to basement space with private garage facilities, wellness area and a bar. The penthouses also each have a private rooftop with swimming pool, bar, toilet and shower. Gardens were designed by Paul Bangay.
Cussell and Eric Loi, a director of Prime Edition, which developed Como Toorak, declined to comment. Chiminello was contacted for comment.
Cussell is now marketing a three-bedroom investment apartment Kennedy owns at 1/97 Mathoura Road in Toorak. It has a $5.75 million price guide.
Michael Bleby, Deputy property editor
AFR
Jun 23, 2026