Top Boston sale is a Beacon Hill mansion 

The handsome Greek Revival townhouse at 8 Mt. Vernon Place on Beacon Hill is the city’s most expensive home sale to date this year.

The 16-room brick mansion was sold earlier this month for $10.89 million, twice its assessed value of $5.345 million. Price per square foot was $1,146.

Beth Dickerson of Gibson Sotheby’s International Realty sold the home to a top-notch real estate attorney from Dallas.

The property had been on the market briefly about two years ago until the owner, an international businessman, decided to withdraw it from the market and lease it instead.

Its exterior is like many Beacon Hill homes –brick façade with six-over-six windows and black shutters. It swells on the side like a bow front, and in the back is a two-story oriel.

Inside, the home comprises an elegant entryway, a wide formal living room and dining room, a luxurious master bedroom suite with a sumptuous bath and a floor designated specifically for children. Altogether there are five-plus bedrooms, four full baths, two powder rooms, plus an elevator.

The amazing eat-in kitchen with high-end finishes and appliances features a Christopher Peacock design and is the second design he has completed in this home, according to Dickerson. The kitchen is on the garden level.

The original carriage house, which opens to Joy Place, has been transformed into a large home office, a mudroom and a bath.

Between the home and the carriage house, directly off the kitchen, is a patio and a huge private garden, hidden by a high brick wall.

From the second floor, the staircase echoes the shape of a nautilus shell. The stairhall rises 25 feet. Today the walls have been changed.

Parking is not a problem either, as two spaces directly in front of the house are reserved for the residents. Mount Vernon Place is a private way.

One of the most stunning architectural details of the home is the original curved staircase, created by the famed architect, Alexander Parris, who designed many Beacon Hill homes. The stair hall rises 25 feet. Other original elements include several handsome Italian marble fireplaces.

This home has a rich history. Built in 1833, the home once belonged to Theodore Lyman, who was the fifth mayor of Boston from 1834 to 1835. (Lyman is remembered as having saved William Lloyd Garrison from a howling mob that had intended to lynch the abolitionist. Lyman jailed him for his own protection.)

The Unitarian Universalist Association had owned the building about 30 years and used it for offices for Beacon Press, its publishing house. In 2001 the organization sold the property, and after a three-year-long renovation, the new owners moved in.

The townhouse was featured in a beautiful book, “Restoring a House in the City,” by Ingrid Abramovich, that was published in 2009. A subsequent owner undertook his own meticulous renovation to produce this jewel and now has sold it.