House of the Day: 72 Hicks Street
Recently reduced to $3,750,000 from a starting price of $4,995,000 earlier this year (with a couple of intermediate stops along the way), this gorgeous woodframe house at 72 Hicks Street in Brooklyn Heights must be coming into range for some well-heeled buyer. After all, this is one of the oldest houses in the Heights, dating…
Recently reduced to $3,750,000 from a starting price of $4,995,000 earlier this year (with a couple of intermediate stops along the way), this gorgeous woodframe house at 72 Hicks Street in Brooklyn Heights must be coming into range for some well-heeled buyer. After all, this is one of the oldest houses in the Heights, dating back to the 1820s, and it’s a 25-footer. On top of that, it looks extremely well-preserved. By comparison, Brown Harris still has this house at 19 Garden Place listed at $3,995,000. Which do you think is a better deal?
72 Hicks Street [Kevin Carberry] GMAP P*Shark
I used to live across the street, up a block and I love that house. It is a lovely neighborhood too, a block from the 2, 3 at Clark or A at High Street. Very very pretty.
Well, I’m not knowledgable of the upscale reno world which is why I asked to find out which houses you’re talking about. I’d be curious to see these Willow Street houses if you’d ID them (or the architect/designer).
It’s funny that somebody who writes, “it is the responsibility of the enlightened owner…” would accuse somebody else of being a “design nazi.”
Denature: Perfect choice of words, Sam.
I like old houses and I like when they are treated properly. If they have had things stripped or gunked up, it is the responsibility of the enlightened owner to undo the gunk and restore the missing. Lately, the trend has been to just gut these houses and to start from a “blank canvas” there are several architects out there who are currently active in brooklyn, who are paticularly to blame for this. Actually, there is one in particular, and it is not DiDonno, who is usually a good guy.
It costs a lot of money to completely denature a house and the owners are usually quite wealthy and do not purchase mediocre houses. They often purchase the best houses with the best finishes and then hire the design nazi to talk them into removing everything that predates him. Those of you knowledgable of the upscale reno world know who I am referring to. And it’s not bullshit. Two houses on Willow Street in BH have recently been “gutted” and these houses where among the loveliest in the area.
Which houses have been stripped of beautiful and well-preserved interiors? Certainly there have been some renovations that resulted in modern interiors, but like the house profiled in last Sunday’s NYT, I think they all had been stripped of original detail long ago.
i am more skeptical of sam’s statement that there is a “troubling trend” of homes being “stripped of beautiful and well-preserved interiors in order to create loft-like modernistic spaces.” now THAT sounds like an exaggeration. when i walk around brownstone neighborhoods and peek in windows, i am always impressed by how many homes DO retain their original details.
cobblehiller – whether it’s odd to modernize the design of a brownstone or not depends on the circumstances. it really does matter how much detail there was in the first place, whether it was of good quality and whether it was salvageable. it really does matter how much it will cost to replace what’s missing, mostly destroyed or gunked over by years of crap renovations. it really does matter how wide the place is, and how much light it gets. it really does matter whether that person wants to live in a house with a yard in brooklyn as opposed to a loft in an apartment building with maintenance costs and finicky neighbors or a new house in some godforsaken suburb.
and, sam, those “involved” in removing original construction and detail will only try to minimize it if they’re embarrassed about it. i renovated a brownstone and i will tell you quite proudly exactly what we did and did not do to remove, salvage and replace detail. and i will tell you exactly why. whether you choose to believe it is not a matter of my credibility but a matter of the bee in your (perfectly period-appropriate, i’m sure) bonnet.
I agree with you sam that if the architectural details are there they should be preserved and restored and not stripped. But if some a-hole gutted a place or there was an all-consuming fire then it’s fair game for a minimalist modern interior.
I also agree that to tear the building down and rebuild a modern facade in a neighborhood full of brownstones (landmarked or not) would be a travesty.