Category: Real Estate

The builder here may have owned a stone yard or at least had a mason in the family. It’s common to see rusticated stone used around the foundation, even up to the bottom of the ground-floor windows. It’s also not unusual to see porch columns built of rough-cut stone. Those details were used on a variety of Arts and Crafts-style houses in the 1920s and ’30s.

Here the same stone shows up as a hefty surround at all windows and doors — even on the second floor! A parapet dormer is fully clad in limestone, with a keystone centered above a pair of windows. This keystone detail — plus pointed arches cut into and mounted under the box beams around the porch roof — and the combination of rough stonework with brick on the exterior are all hallmarks of the Tudor Revival style.

Apparently still not satisfied, the masons installed a porch rail made of square-cut limestone balusters with a cast-concrete cap that aligns with a belt course that runs under the ground-floor windows. There’s another belt course under the second-floor windows. The craftsmen were certainly showing off their skills here, and the wealth of detail is amazing.

The same effort and skills carry over to the interior. The trim in the living and dining rooms is local red gum, the best Memphis had to offer. It’s also impressive that it has never suffered the indignity of a paint job. It’s just too beautiful to paint! There are no Tudor touches inside; it’s more classic Midtown with some Craftsman detailing in the living-room fireplace, the staircase’s sawn-board balustrade, and the paneled wainscot capped by a plate rail in the dining room. The interior-trim carpenter must have felt inspired by all that exterior masonry work, and it shows.

Better-than-average finishes were used in several areas. The narrow oak flooring that is common throughout Midtown almost never shows up in the kitchen, where more economical yellow pine was commonplace; here it is oak. It’s also remarkable that little renovation has been done here. You certainly aren’t paying for anyone else’s mistakes. The kitchen is the exception. Its 1970s tile countertops and glossy oak cabinetry are dated. A total renovation would help both the appearance and the function of this kitchen.

Delicate stained-glass windows ornament the staircase landing and the ground-floor powder room. Upstairs are three bedrooms, the largest running full-width across the front of the house. A rear, glassed-in room, probably a sleeping porch, is a perfect home office or guest room.

The full bath upstairs deserves a mention for its extra-long soaking tub and separate shower lined with luxuriously tall slabs of white Italian marble and furnished with a surface-mounted shower valve and over-sized rainfall shower head.

This wonderfully intact foursquare is a marvel, even today.

1245 Sledge

Approximately 2,160 sq. ft.

3 bedrooms, 1-1/2 baths $164,000

Realtor: Revid, 725-7766

Agent: Lindsay Proctor, 438-6002

Generally, bungalow layouts are predictable: a porch across the front, a bay off to one side, and an interior hall that has two bedrooms and a bath that open off of it and connect the front of the house and the kitchen. Usually, you’d wish that the rooms could be just a bit bigger — but not inside this Evergreen bungalow!

From outside, all you notice that’s atypical is that the porch is reduced to a small, covered entry with a brick archway, and — most unusual for a bungalow — the fireplace is on the front. It wouldn’t be much of a reach to suggest that the Spanish Colonial Revival, quite popular in the 1930s when this house was built, had just a little influence here.

Inside, the living room runs a generous 22 feet deep. The dining room benefits from a full-width bay that lets light stream in from three sides.

Both the living and dining rooms have gorgeous, native red-gum trim that includes a deep cove molding at the ceiling. The living room fireplace has an elegant Arts and Crafts, earth-toned tile surround and is flanked by back-lit, glass-doored bookcases.

The eat-in kitchen was renovated not long ago. One end has a breakfast area with an antique, stained glass chandelier. The other end has a built-in banquette and French doors to the rear courtyard. The cabinets are all painted. and there are plenty of them, which means that there’s also lots of counter workspace, including a breakfast bar.

The other half of the ground floor is equally surprising. The front

bedroom, entered only from the living room, is a master or guest suite with an updated but original full bath. The middle bedroom, like the dining room, is enhanced by another room-wide bay window and is now used as a media/family room. The full bath off the hall serves as the powder room and is also convenient to the back bedroom.

Upstairs has been fully renovated as an even larger master suite, with a bedroom 23-by-17 feet, and it has three pairs of large windows. Its bath has a claw-foot tub, a separate shower, and both toilet and bidet. The sink is installed in an antique cabinet.

Out back, the courtyard has a large paved area for seating and entertaining, a fairly recent development but a true patio, in keeping with the Spanish Colonial tone of the house.

The rest of the yard is lushly planted and has an arbor covered in flowering vines. A guest house provides overflow space and makes a nice rear edge for the courtyard. On the main house, a retractable awing over the French doors creates a sun screen for the summer but allows solar gain in the winter.

It’s rare to find a bungalow with rooms of this scale and with finishes and craftsmanship this good. It’s certainly not noticeably larger than average from the street, but all that proves is that you can’t judge any bungalow by its cover. •

267 Avalon

Approximately 2,500 square feet

4 bedrooms; 3 baths

$359,000

Realtor: Crye-Leike, 276-8800

Agent: Bill Malone, 359-4000

Buildings seldom hang around for 160 years without going through some changes. This one was built as a four-room house in the 1840s. Few of its contemporaries are left today.

The house was one block from the station for the rail line that began the run from town to Buntyn in 1855 and eventually connected Memphis to Charleston. During the Civil War, Confederate munitions were stored on the property, because it was near the depot, and the land is now part of the Arsenal Grounds subdivision.

After the war, General Luke E. Wright built a large dwelling in front of the original house that then was converted into a carriage house. It remained just that way for a hundred years, until urban renewal struck downtown in the 1960s.

In the name of progress, most of Victorian Village was slated for demolition. Fortunately, the great grandson of General Wright, Eldridge Wright, convinced the newly formed Association for the Preservation of Tennessee Antiquities to step in.

Eldridge Wright was not able to save his family’s house, and it was demolished when Jefferson Avenue was widened. He did salvage the bricks and used them to enclose the carriage house within a 10-foot high wall. In 1974, Eldridge commissioned architect Oscar Menzer to restore the carriage house and to design an addition to it. Tall, cypress French doors were installed on the ground floor below existing arch-headed casement windows on the second floor. The ground floor has wide oak flooring and finely finished plaster walls and ceilings. The drawing room and dining room both have 18th-century mantels above the wood-burning fireplaces. An addition to the west houses a modern galley kitchen and breakfast room. The kitchen was recently updated with new cabinets, honed granite counters, and slate floors. A gated parking court just west of the kitchen is paved with granite cobbles.

The upstairs has the same plan as the ground floor but has heart pine floors. A large master bedroom above the drawing room has one wall of fitted closets with hand-milled cypress doors and trim. A wood-burning fireplace with an wood mantle graces this room.The master bath has travertine floors and a granite-topped vanity. The original cupola’s tin roof was replaced with glass to allow natural light in the bath.

The second bedroom, above the dining room, has the fourth wood-burning fireplace. The full bath here has been fitted with a washer and dryer in place of the tub, but that could be reversed if the laundry was moved to the kitchen wing. A second-floor deck is off this bedroom. With its views into the densely landscaped walled garden, it might be one of the most private decks downtown.

The house is stunning, but the high surrounding wall creates a setting that feels like a quiet corner of the French Quarter. You’d be hard-pressed to find a refuge more romantic than this. •

688 Jefferson

Approximately 800 square feet

2 bedrooms, 2 baths; $449,000

Realtor: Sowell and Co, 278-4380

Agent: Scott W. Blake, 277-0223

Some houses have more interesting lives than others. This is one of them. It was built on Poplar in the mid-19th century and was the Lake family’s farmhouse. It has a typical Greek Revival floor plan and probably had a porch with box columns in its first incarnation and maybe even a detached kitchen.

Around 1900, it was picked up and moved north down Willett. At that time, a Victorian porch with turned columns and a spindle-work frieze was added.

The wide center hall has two large rooms on each side. A rear service ell was appended after the move, with a bath, family dining room, kitchen, and side porch.

Sometime during the 20th century, it was converted into a triplex. The windows on each side of the front doors were turned into doors, and a few other rooms were built in the side yard. In 1982, all that was reversed — the odd additions demolished, the two extraneous front doors removed, and the side porch reopened. Central heat and air and a new bath and kitchen were installed.

Ceilings in the original four rooms and hall are a stunning 12 feet tall. Four-panel doors have side-hung, operable transoms to aid cross-ventilation. The floors are richly colored heart pine, and the windows are seriously tall.

In the back ell, the baths and kitchen have been recently updated. Large porcelain tiles used on the floor of the main bath match the limestone used on the vanity and storage cabinet tops. A large shower is similarly tiled, and the ceiling is beadboard.

The dining room and kitchen are divided only by a freestanding old brick chimney that once was the heat source for both rooms. The kitchen has new granite counters and a backsplash of hand-painted Mexican tiles. The wall cabinets are all open shelving and don’t provide tons of storage but could be easily replaced with tall glass-doored cabinets to good effect. A powder room and laundry are just off the kitchen.

Windows on both sides of the rear addition admit lots of light. The kitchen, as well as the front hall, connects to the side porch, which seems built for outdoor living. Custom screen doors with a sunburst motif allow for great circulation, both for air and people. A large, old crape myrtle dominates the side yard and casts the porch in shade by midday.

This is an easy-living house with a casual layout. The rooms are all well-scaled. The tall windows have half-height plantation shutters that provide ample privacy. The house is on a quiet block of Willett with a nice mix of smaller cottages and sizable four-squares, all from the first two decades of the 20th century. This is the family house for which the Lake subdivision area of Evergreen was named, and its trip around the block only makes its story all the more interesting.

286 N. Willett

Approximately 1,800 square feet

3 bedrooms, 1-1/2 baths

$233,000

Realtor: Hobson Co., 761-1622

Agent: Barbara Cowles, 312-2979

This house looks like it originated as a two-room shotgun with a bathroom on the back porch — and like Jack’s beanstalk, it just grew and grew. Today, it’s up to 1,560 square feet, with an intimate courtyard down one side and still room for a yard and a garage in the rear.

The original front porch with its beadboard ceiling has been glassed in to make a sunroom. Then the two windows between the sunroom and the living room were removed to open the living room up to all that light. Top-mounted, Bahamas-style shutters were added outside the sunroom to insure privacy. A fancy Eastlake door with old, rippled glass, easily original to the house, is now the entrance to the sun room.

The living room has 10-foot ceilings and narrow planked floors, now painted, but most probably of heart pine. A fireplace with gas logs is set off by a period mantle. A den has been recently added adjoining the living room. It provides overflow seating for larger gatherings and, with French doors and a private half-bath, can double as an occasional third bedroom/guestroom.

The kitchen and dining room are next in line and are the functional center of activity. A wall of casement windows that overlooks the courtyard fills the kitchen with light. There are a couple of generations of counters, some ceramic and some granite, but they all blend well with the off-white, antiqued cabinetry. There is a comfy breakfast bar and another serving bar between the kitchen and dining area.

Beyond the kitchen is a short hall with an exterior door to the courtyard that makes dining outdoors just a step away. In the courtyard, old brick paving is complemented by a tall latticed fence and extended rafters that create an arbor, allowing vines to clamber up and over the narrow exterior space, creating a lush, cozy setting any time of day.

The rear yard is sheltered under a massive Southern magnolia. The one-car garage has seen better days but is the kind of rebuild that won’t impact your life while it’s happening. A wood fence lends privacy from the side street.

A bath and bedroom with a spacious walk-in closet are just behind the kitchen. A newly built master suite simply extends the shotgun roof ever more rearward. The master bedroom ceiling is vaulted and a pair of French doors to the courtyard provide a private exterior focus. The master bath and its walk-in closet buffer this area from the rest of the house.

Even though this shotgun retains a very linear plan, its seating areas are adjacent, its kitchen and dining area are well connected, and the bedrooms are tucked away to the rear. Many brand-new houses are neither as well laid out nor as imaginative an assemblage of materials and spaces as this grown-up shotgun. •

541 Rembert Street

Approximately 1,560 square feet

2 bedrooms, 2-1/2 baths $179,000

Realtor: Crye-Leike, 756-8900

Agent: Tonda Lea Thomas 219-7259

Colonial architecture seems to be one style that never goes out of style, particularly in the South. Not only was it good enough for George Washington, it still plays well today. The style did fall out of favor during the late 19th century, when the exoticism of Victoriana reigned, but since America’s centennial in 1876, the Colonial style has remained popular.

Greentrees is a beautifully wooded residential area just south of Poplar Pike at Kirby Parkway. It’s well located for work or shopping and quite close to Memphis University School and Hutchison. The neighborhood is a mix of traditional styles, along with some very contemporary houses, and has an active neighborhood association.

This house is a variation on the Greek Revival style, typical of large plantations in the Colonial period in the deep South. These houses often had tall, two-story porches, built with galleries on each level to ensure ventilation and convenient circulation for rooms on either floor. Fortunately, from an energy conservation standpoint, this house does face south, so that the double galleries actually shade the front windows from heat in the summer months.

The front entry is slate floored, so you’ll never worry about what guests might track in. To one side is a sizable dining room, and the other side is a home office or nursery. The most used public spaces — the kitchen, breakfast, and family rooms — are arranged just behind and look out to the rear yard.

The kitchen was gutted, and new slate floors installed there and in the breakfast room. The kitchen cabinetry is a honey-toned cherry that is set off well against matte-black counters. It’s a combination that’s both striking and carefree. There’s a step down to the nine-foot-tall family room, which has a wood floor and is paneled. Old brick is used to good effect on the raised hearth and the fireplace surround.

The master suite is at one end with its own fireplace and room enough for a seating area. Its large bath has two nicely outfitted walk-ins and a ceramic tile floor that looks like limestone. The other end of the downstairs houses a pantry, a powder room, and a two-car garage with workshop.

Upstairs there are three bedrooms and two baths. A new, second master suite was created over the garage, and it’s even larger than the one on the ground floor. There’s also a spacious playroom upstairs that is well zoned for media activities, as well as more active pursuits, like a game of pool. There’s a wet bar and refrigerator, should you need to wet your whistle.

Out back there is an in-ground swimming pool with a gazebo overlooking one end. The rear yard is surrounded by a board fence and enclosed by tall trees. A grand willow oak out front casts the front galleries in deep shade, so all that’s missing from this Southern Colonial is a mint julep.

6564 Black Thorne Cove

Approximately 3,800 square feet

4 bedrooms, 3-1/2 baths; $449,000

Realtor: Marx & Bensdorf 682-1868

Agent: Sheldon Rosengarten

The 1920s in Memphis were a time of economic expansion. All of Midtown was enjoying a building boom. Rhodes College had just relocated to Memphis and was building its new campus, and Hein Park was going up right beside it.

The increase in urban density was derided by some as unhealthy. Tuberculosis was on the rise and publications extolled the virtues of fresh air.

Rear latticed porches were commonly used as summer kitchens in an attempt to escape the heat. The large two-story houses of the early 20th century often had another porch above, to be used by the whole family as summer sleeping quarters. An outdoor place to sleep not only helped beat the heat, but the night air was considered to be freer from dust and other impurities.

This bungalow from the early 1920s went yet a step further in the fresh-air craze: The two-story house was built around a swimming pool placed in the center of the second floor, with 10-foot ceilings to help evacuate heat and nearly 15-foot ceilings in the pool area. Clerestory windows, three feet tall, filled all four sides of this elevated space over the pool, making the whole central room a “lantern” that lit the center of the house.

Fireplaces throughout the house — not just in the living and dining rooms, as you might expect, but also in the central pool room and the front screened porch, now glassed in — allowed residents to enjoy the benefits of fresh air even though it might be a tad nippy out.

The pool has long been filled in. The central room now has narrow oak floors just like the rest of the main floor. This central space feels like an industrial loft, giving it renewed appeal for contemporary living.

The perimeter rooms include a small living room, a separate dining room, a spacious kitchen with breakfast area, and four bedrooms.

Though now inhabited comfortably, the whole space would benefit from a thorough renovation in and out. The interior moldings, diamond-paned windows, and oak floors give it a lot of appeal. There is also a lower floor that is not as large as the main floor because the abandoned pool fills the center.

In these days of rising utility costs, it is impressive to see a still-working example of how passive design can ventilate and cool a house. Healthy living is always in style.

540 Hawthorne

Approximately 4,000 square feet

4 bedrooms, 3 baths; $359,000

Realtor: Marx and Bensdorf, 682-1868

Agent: Melody Bourell, 461-4016