Droolworthy Mantelpiece at D-Squared
Even though we have nine (non-working) fireplaces in our house, we got a serious case of mantel envy while flipping through the Demolition Depot website yesterday. This 1870’s mahogany mantel and over-mantel came out of a brownstone on 128th Street in Harlem recently and can be all yours for the low, low price of $8,500….
Even though we have nine (non-working) fireplaces in our house, we got a serious case of mantel envy while flipping through the Demolition Depot website yesterday. This 1870’s mahogany mantel and over-mantel came out of a brownstone on 128th Street in Harlem recently and can be all yours for the low, low price of $8,500. The entire piece is just over 12-feet high so probably only appropriate for parlor floor usage in proper Victorian-era brownstones. It’s way out of our price range but, man, is it a beauty.
1870’s Mahogany Mantel [Demolition Depot]
Greene Avenue runs east west and is north of Fulton Street. Grand is one block west of Classon, the official (I guess) Border of Bed Sty and Clinton Hill.
Ok, first, Eddie of Grand and Greene fame is Eddie Hibbert, retired NYC Fire marshall and owner of two garage like buildings on Greene, has an architectural salvage business. He is a very personable, honest and kind person who has helped many owners clear out interiors of brownstones for many reasons. The stuff he gets is constantly recycled into the renovations going on all over the place. His place is filled to the rafters with doors, fireplaces, bits and pieces of everything from humble kitchy light fixtures to railings, moldings, old sinks, etc. It is a great place and Eddie has really helped me with my renovation. Both with the stuff and with his sense of humor. Whenever I leave there my latest disaster is transformed into new comic material and as he says, it works out. He is open 12-6 from Tuesday to Saturday, closed Sunday and Monday.
About the previous posters comments, I am of a like mind. A lot of the Victoriana is overwhelming to me and I don’t like it. I am not a big fan of dark heavy furniture, massive mahogany moldings. I hate feeling like I broke into a gentleman’s club. So I renovated my place trying to maintain the historic nature of the house but to maximize light. I am more a fan of carved marble fireplaces, though I can appreciate the posted fireplace from a workmanship perspective.
I think we all take what we like of this Victorian world and try to transform it somehow to work with our modern life and sensibility.
That mantel is kinda ugly though, no? Some styles have a kind of intrinsic beauty to them, which keeps despite the passage of time. But the victorian era created some ghastly monstrosities, in my opinion. I’ve been trying to figure out why it aged so badly, and I think it’s because the Victorian time saw the trend of mixing and matching just about any influence from any culture into an Englishized lump of gharishness.
Anyway, I guess it’s still valuable for the craftsmanship that went into it.
It’d still hate to have that thing in my house, scaring the kids.
Who is Eddie and where is Grand and Greene? we will need all of the above for our renovation and he sounds like a wonderful person to do business with
I live in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. Many gut renovations are always going on out here, mostly near Chinatown. Great stuff is always being thrown out! So if you’re interested in finding treasure check out the dumpsters out here. It breaks my heart to see all this great old stuff go to the dump!
Poachers are not the only ones who are guilty of raping these homes. I find great historic details thrown in the trash by the owners who are renovating. Their loss is my gain…and it’s FREE!
Yeah, I am gradually adding back details to my brownstone that were stripped out. I heard from the seller that the place was cleaned out by thieves at one point – they stripped the wainscoating off the walls in the stairways and the marble fireplaces. I bought 2 fireplaces from Eddie Hibbert of Grand and Greene fame and was joking to him that I was probably buying back my original fireplaces. It was a joke, but he took me very seriously and said that he only sells stuff that he takes out himself on salvage jobs. (Some developers still think stripping the guts of old buildings and replacing them with sheetrock is a good idea). Anyhow Eddie and his crew come by his doors, railings, fireplaces, windows, etc. that way. I believe Eddie. But I can’t speak for the rest of them. I have been adding back piece by piece stuff that has been lifted from my place, pre-me.
I recently learned of this very same thing happening on my block in PLG to a home that went into foreclosure some years back. This particular house had one of the most gorgeous, unaltered interiors of the entire row. In fact, when I used to visit the neighbor who lived there, I always used to marvel at it with a bit of envy because the finishes in my own home were not quite as ubiquitous and grand. Not long ago another neighbor informed me that she witnessed a whole crew who carted off mantels, columns, pier mirrors, pocket doors, stained glass, etc. from the house by the truckload. This occurred in the gap between the foreclosed owner moving out and the resale. I guess the new owners never even knew what they missed.
I’m the upstate brownstoner. I live in Albany. Small city, obviously, but it’s filled with brownstone/rowhouse/townhouse architecture. Prices are generally in the $100,000 to $300,000 range — less in certain neighborhoods and more for something really special. I live in a downtown historic district developed between 1830 and 1900 around two city parks. It was once the wealthy, elite part of town. But familiar urban story … The nabe fell on very hard times until it was ‘rediscovered’ and revitalized in the past 20 years. Houses range from early frame construction and modest rowhouses to former mansions of up to 8,000 sf. Many of the bigger buildings have long since been converted to apartments, but there are many examples still of brownstones in original condition with original layouts. (My brownstone was never altered from its single-family configuration.)