Situated on a garden landscape formally part of an historic site in Georgetown, this 1887’s brick Italianate house shared a fate all too common for elegant nineteenth-century structures: twentieth-century alterations that neither considered history or an integrated vision of the house as a whole. A small intervention in the 1920’s haphazardly extended the rear of the house, and, in the 1950’s, a large addition poorly executed with cheap materials was tacked onto the side, resulting in an ungainly and unwieldy warren-like abode. We embraced the unique challenge of returning this historic house and site to its majestic grandeur. Drawing inspiration from the terrain and the owner’s desire for luxurious and grand spaces, we looked at the tradition of English manor houses –  a vision that would require close consultation with the historic review board, given the significance of the site. A full gutting of the interior, including moving load-bearing walls, enabled a complete reconfiguration to achieve broad, sweeping public and private spaces in this 10,000-square-foot residence. The entrance foyer, with a gracious, curved reception area, has a side opening  to a wide living room for formal entertaining with offset library for more private meetings. An enticing vista from the foyer takes the eye down a central hall that offers  access to the formal dining room and leads to the more casual and open chef’s kitchen and pavilion sunroom. A stunning cantilevered stairway with wrought iron design rises from the foyer to the second floor private spaces, including an 80-foot-long, 1800-square-foot primary bedroom suite. The dramatic stair continues to the third floor occupied by a  nursery with full bedroom/bathroom suites. The house offers nine exquisitely appointed private full bathrooms in total. The lower level continues to convey the manor theme through a mahogany panelled billiard room, wine cellar, and a full catering kitchen. The details throughout the house underscore a return to nineteenth-century craftsmanship: crown molding created by hand in plaster, 36-inch-high wainscoting, window casings that extend to the floor. The garden wing of the pavilion sunroom, answering a contemporary need for both informal indoor gathering and outdoor garden party entertaining, exemplifies the elegant fusion of this English manor style with contemporary design. Two walls of windows and French doors fill the sunroom with light while offering views to the English garden and historic grounds beyond. To fully integrate the modernity of the pavilion design within the sculpted landscape and the heritage of the house as a whole, we wrapped the pavilion sunroom with a doric colonnade. From three disparate moments in time, we undid a century of negative interventions to create a majestic dwelling fitting for the site’s history and the demands of a twenty-first-century residence in our nation’s capital.

Photography by Bob Narod