Blake Lively appears to hope she can rehabilitate her tattered reputation, following her bruising legal battle against Justin Baldoni, by parading around at the Met Gala on May 4 and by getting her photo taken on Tuesday evening while shopping for designer purses at a new-collection launch party at the Fendi flagship store in New York City.
But as Lively turned up at the Fendi party, sporting a black mirrored Fendi baguette worth thousands of dollars, she and her husband, Ryan Reynolds, were hit with reports that raise “humiliating” new questions about the state of their marriage and their financial situation in the wake of her failure to definitively prove her sexual harassment and retaliation claims against Baldoni, her “It Ends With Us” director and co-star. These new reports also could open a new window on the Hollywood power couple’s perceived sense of entitlement and the way they treat people who work for them.
On the day Lively attended the Fendi party and mingled with other celebrities, the Daily Mail broke the news that the couple’s long-planned, sprawling upstate New York “dream home” remains unfinished and that they owe a combined $2.1 million for unpaid work to contractors. The Daily Mail, TMZ and other outlets cited records from Westchester County, which say that five contractors and subcontractors filed mechanics liens totaling that amount against the couple’s 110-acre property in April.
Blake Lively joined the House to celebrate the Baguette®️26424 Re-Edition at FENDI 57th Street in New York City pic.twitter.com/BvY3HYkeXh
— Fendi (@Fendi) May 21, 2026
Lively and Reynolds quietly purchased the property in South Salem, a ritzy hamlet in the town of Lewisboro, 60 miles north of New York City, through an LLC in 2018, the Daily Mail reported. They reportedly paid $12 million for this parcel and subsequently purchased surrounding parcels to create what Lively described as a “beautiful buffer” for their growing family of four children. During a 2022 town planning board meeting, Lively gushed about the property, describing it as “the most beautiful place on earth,” and saying she was “desperate to get shovels in the ground and be living on this land,” the Daily Mail also reported.
The couple’s attorney also said they planned to make the new luxury compound their primary residence, with plans to build a 14,500-square-foot main home, along with a pool, pool house, gym, geothermal heating systems and other high-end features, TMZ reported. Construction got underway and is thought to have continued into late 2025 before “grinding to a halt” in December or in early 2026, the Daily Mail added. Since then, it appears that one construction company alone filed a claim for more than $1.35 million tied to the work, including framing, plumbing, HVAC, electrical, drywall and masonry, TMZ said.
Both the Daily Mail and TMZ said the timing of the lien is likely to raise fresh questions about the couple’s finances — as they continue to navigate the fallout from Lively’s legal battle against Baldoni. During the “nasty legal war,” 10 of Lively’s 13 claims against Baldoni, including her sexual harassment claims, were thrown out by a federal judge, while Baldoni’s defamation case against Lively and Reynolds was dismissed. The settlement was announced on May 4, hours before Lively turned up at the Met Gala. The settlement included no money for either side.
Meanwhile, the court battle has already cost both sides tens of millions of dollars in legal fees and reputational damage. Lively’s legal team, though, is hoping to use recent California legislation to get her attorneys’ fees, as well as compensatory and punitive damages, covered by Baldoni.
