Going on Spec

The neglected façade was an eyesore. New roofing, tinwork, period-style windows, a brass kick plate on the door, vintage hardware and cleaned, repointed masonry brought it up to snuff without altering its historical integrity. Photos by Yerko Pallominy

It had so much going for it — it was a handsome 1900-vintage three-story rowhouse in one of the most prestigious and well-located in-town locations. Not only did the house sit in a historic district where Landis had done several projects and wanted to do more, but the redesigned and renovated house could be a showplace of the core work Landis does, says Ethan.

It would be no low-cost, quick-turnaround project. The owner hadn't lived in there since a small fire charred one end of the second floor 25 years earlier. Though sprinkled with fine turn-of-the-century features, the interior was hopelessly deteriorated and dated. Bringing the house back to life would require a gut remodel tempered with painstaking restoration of period details and reconstructing the two-story rear extension.

The project landed in Landis's lap after the owner died in 2004. One of the owner's relatives asked Landis to estimate the cost of remodeling the house, thinking she might buy it from the estate, then remodel and sell it. The relative decided not to proceed with the project, but Ethan couldn't pass it up. In October 2004, Landis took out a loan and bought the property from the estate for $600,000, planning to sell it quickly and customize the remodel with features and finishes of the new buyer's choice. That's not what happened.

The third floor opens onto the new roof terrace.

Anticipating the priorities of buyers looking to live in the neighborhood, he oversaw the design of a remodel that celebrated the old-house charm but created a modern, open floor plan. Every inch counted in the shoebox shaped house, which is only 16 feet wide and about 62 feet front to back. He pulled out first-floor walls to create a wide open kitchen-dining-living space. The second floor gained a bathroom and laundry area so that both the master bedroom and the second bedroom have private baths. Two rooms on the third floor were designed to be bedrooms or office space; they share a bathroom and a new third-floor roof terrace.

The basement presented opportunities as well as problems. Ethan wanted to raise the ceiling — or lower the floor — of the basement in the main house and the rear addition to add a versatile space the owners could use as an in-law suite, office, home theater or nanny apartment. In a landlocked rowhouse with access only through the front door or a narrow alley, this meant three days of digging by hand and lugging the dirt away bucket by bucket. "We dug out about 2 feet," down to the main plumbing line to yield 7½ foot ceilings says project manager Alan Hobbs.

Before

Befor the renovation, a pantry cut off the kitchen from the living area. Large dressing areas wasted space on the upper floors but left some bedrooms closetless. Landis created an airy, open kitchen-dining-living area and reallocated the upstairs space to carve out an extra bathroom on the second floor and closets for all rooms.

Though white walls and shiny new fixtures made the interior of the house look bright and fresh, Ethan preserved as many antique features as possible. That included much of the antique heart pine flooring. Refinishing the floor and feathering in new, matching strips added a week or two to the job, but it was probably worth doing. "It's a charm thing," Ethan says. He was able to reuse the old stair treads, banister and many of the pickets, replacing damaged pickets with custom-made clones and putting in a custom-turned railing on the newly opened first floor staircase to match the old railings.

The interior still displays the patina of age but, served by all new plumbing and wiring plus high-efficiency HVAC systems and insulation, it offers a level of comfort unheard of when the house was originally built.

After decades of neglect, the house's façade regained its standing in the neighborhood. Landis cleaned up the front door, fitted it out with period hardware from a salvage store, and installed energy-efficient windows that look like originals. Hobbs pulled out and reset a masonry panel under the bay window, replaced the copper gutters and formed new decorative tin fascia around the third floor balcony. When he removed water-damaged limestone bricks from the third floor to replace them, he was surprised to discover that they were not bricks at all but cinderblocks with a concrete veneer. Landis set up a little "brick factory" on site, dipping about 50 brick-size cinderblocks in concrete and slipping them into place on the historic façade.

Attracting a buyer

As soon as Landis finished construction in March 2006, Ethan listed the property. After three weeks, the house sold for $1.57 million, $21,000 more than the asking price. The new owners were expecting a baby and bought the house for many of the reasons Ethan had predicted: the in-town location; the nice, friendly neighborhood; the old house; the light, bright, open spaces. For the new owners, the house is a smart investment.

Was it a smart investment for Landis Construction? "I would seriously consider doing it again," says Ethan. "I wouldn't jump at it." Chris puts it this way: "You always have to look at the cost-benefit analysis. We would have made more money doing other things for clients and getting paid as we went along. Ethan would have been out selling more work. But it's a great-looking project. We're going to put it on our Web site" to spread the word about the good work Landis Construction can do.