Walking onto the sturdy, brightly painted front porch stairs, there was not so much as a creaky floorboard to distract you from the welcoming and warm view ahead. We met homeowners Dave Turner and Ran Crawford on a crisp, sun-soaked, blue-skied morning in what has to be one of the loveliest towns in America, Chestertown.
Nestled in among some treasured homes near the Chester River and on one of the town’s most desirable blocks, is Turner and Crawford’s cherished forever home, circa 1915. Upon first finding the home back in 2015, the homeowners were impressed with its quality construction, its location within a college town, and its historical background.
Being a historical preservationist, Turner knew the American foursquare, four-bedroom home they were looking at was something really special—and they had been looking for their version of forever for months prior to the discovery. Turner’s background would come in handy again once they purchased the property, but before we explore the home’s future, it’s important to note its remarkable past.
The House That Women Built
Apparently, Chestertown was home to some exceptional individuals in the very early 20th century. In fact, on October 2, 1905 the lead story in the town’s widely-read newspaper, Kent News, proclaimed that, “… a big force of workmen began on Wednesday a new residence…on the elegant lot opposite the home of Carolene Hynson.”
Carolene Hynson, a sagacious widow, partnered with another such widow, Gladys Wickes, to find the resources, both financial and trades-related, to have the home built on speculation. It was also remarked that Mrs. Hynson was approaching her 90th year at the time of the endeavor. Not to mention, this was a time before women even had gained the right to vote, making the home forever memorable in Chestertown as the “house that women built”.
“He immediately called and said, ‘I have this historic house in Chestertown and I’m going to need your help with it,’” says Hartwig-Davis, AIA, LEED AP.
Hartwig-Davis and Turner had crossed paths several times in their pursuits of preservation; he as the chairman of the Historic Preservation Commission for Prince George’s County, and she as an architect securing grants for clients through the Commission.
“Melanie is one of the guardians of Western Shore preservation. This (project) was an extension for her and she did very well coming into the area,” Turner says of Hartwig-Davis’ credentials and background.
Conceiving the Ideal Backdrop
When asked for an adjective to describe the home before they rolled up their sleeves and got to work, Hartwig-Davis replied, “abandoned.” Not in the literal sense, she added, but in that the home had not seen any upgrading with the exception of an extra room tacked on to the back of the house, since the 1970s.
After extensive discussions with Turner and Crawford, she learned their specific priorities for the home. The two primary objectives were: the house had to become a welcoming gallery of sorts for their art, antiques, and their cherished furnishings and memorabilia, and it needed to grow old gracefully with them.
“Specifically, these clients, their goal was to provide an ideal backdrop for their art collections,” Hartwig-Davis says. The second most important aspect, she adds, was the forever home concept. “They wanted to plan for single-level living, so that when and if they have mobility issues, they have everything they need.”
And while single-level living was a priority, there was also a desire to increase the functionality of the home’s second and even third stories. From that the team of three would conceive the perfect way to turn a seemingly abandoned home into what Hartwig-Davis would later characterize as “celebrated.” This suited Turner and Crawford extremely well, as they are consummate hosts and love to entertain—a celebratory home they would have!
“It’s very important to us that people can come into the house and enjoy themselves. And want to come back,” Turner says.
There was no better place to start than with the home’s entryway. While it was clearly an ample space for receiving guests, all agreed it could and should be so much more. The main issue was the entry door to the working kitchen facing the front and it being one of the first things you see upon entering, detracting from the home’s magnificent pre-war stairway and railings. To enhance the “first impression” experience, that kitchen entry was closed off and in its place the homeowners displayed a treasured Egyptian-influenced floor length pier mirror. Reflecting the light streaming through the home’s handsome and original panel and glass front door, the area is now awash in natural light. The replacement was not without angst, Turner told us the mirror in its original form was, in fact, too long for the space by about four inches.
“We actually had to shorten the mirror,” Turner says, explaining it was sent to an expert in Alexandria, Virginia. He is more than pleased with the result. “This is the only thing ‘New York’ in the house,” he adds. Turner and Crawford reside over a collection of furnishings from all over the world, but for Turner, he is all about Baltimore—Baltimore Federal Furniture, that is.
The collection is extensive and starts right when you walk in the house with a glorious Priestley mahogany Federal period sideboard, above which hangs an intricately detailed pencil drawing of a horse belonging to Turner, sketched by a friend. An avid equestrian and proud horse owner, on the same wall Turner also displays the buggy whip he used to win the National Carriage Championship at the prestigious Devon Horse Show in Pennsylvania in 1998.
In addition to various other treasures in just the entryway alone, this area was also chosen for the display of two very distinctive antique banjo clocks, another passion of Turner’s.
Those Value-Engineering Decisions
As you turn toward the left of the entry moving easily across the home’s collection of antique Oriental rugs and its beautifully re-stained walnut and pine floors you are cognizant of how well the home flows with its wide entry room points. As you enter the home’s exquisitely appointed dining room with its blazing hearth, prized Potthast Brothers Baltimore Federal period dining table, and Venetian crystal chandelier you are at once wowed and then immediately drawn into the living room with its eye-catching bronze wall treatment. The one-ton, three-dimensional frieze is an homage reflecting the homeowners’ Texan roots; Ran is originally from Dallas, Dave, from Austin.
The latter’s father once owned a bank and Turner said when the bank was shuttered, he made sure he grabbed it—well, as much as you are able to “grab” a one-ton piece of art.
Thus, the configuration of these main floor rooms was changed to reflect the way the homeowners wish to live now— amongst reminders of lives that continue to be best-lived. So walls did need to come down to incorporate a larger bath on the first level, to create better use of the earlier tacked-on room by turning it into an ample den/future main-level bedroom, and to provide for an island of modernity amongst a sea of antiquity with a sleek 21st-century kitchen design.
When the new walls went up, they were reinforced with studs to help bear the weight of things like the bronze frieze depicting a 20th-century cattle drive. It was during this part of the remodeling when the design challenge plot thickened for the trio. As we are in the heyday of open plan living, Hartwig-Davis was more than happy to give them that living space by removing the wall between the kitchen and living room. However, the owners had a different plan. They did not wish to remove that wall. It served as great “gallery” space, and the pair is among the smaller contingent of homeowners feeling that open-plan design may be in its waning days as opposed to its heyday.
Nevertheless, the use of space is optimal. The frieze has its pride of place in the living room which is an inviting mixture of eras’ worth of functional collectibles such as the traditional wing chair reupholstered and upscaled by Ran with an earthy zebra pattern in cool tones and an Art Nouveau-era heavy leaded glass coffee table they picked up at the Washington Craft Show at the Smithsonian.
The living room flows to a small common area from which they can access the guest bath, the den, the kitchen, the breakfast area, and last but not least, the deck that leads to a precious wooded wonderland a-typical for most of Chestertown. But we’ll get back to that.
The kitchen is where the “value-engineering decisions” a term coined by the homeowners to reflect their thinking of what to splurge on and what to think more frugally about, came about. The kitchen represented a consensus for the trio; they would go ultra-modern with a rustic touch or two. That rustic part came about fairly early on when a piece of built-out wall was removed and a glorious, original-to-the-home chimney was unearthed. While sturdy of structure, its frame was ever so slightly tilted providing for a rich-in-character conversation piece. The brick chimney was painted white and nearby storage spaces were created to provide a recessed framework for the must-have ginormous stainless-steel refrigerator required by Turner. Ginormous, but brand-frugal, he mused. A door was put in adjacent to the chimney providing discreet access to the living room.
A waterfall-edge counter of supple light gray quartz wraps around the opposite side of the room creating all the counter space one could need for whipping up a great meal. The flow interrupted here only by the dual basin sink and gooseneck tap faucet with an ample vertical sliding window above for fresh air and rays of light. The backsplash choice, a no-brainer.
“We noticed that backsplash fashions go in and out so darn fast, but we also noticed that brick always hangs in there, and so we got colonial brick to play off the chimney feature,” Turner says.
A two-tone treatment of gray cabinets below and white above in polished push-touch lacquer add sophistication and clean lines and edges. The kitchen nook area is clean and gleaming yet warm with several wood touches in the chairs and a late, 18th-century pew from Ran’s family church back in Texas to off-set the clear acrylic table for four.
Opposite the breakfast area is one of those walls that says it all. In part, it tells a tale of two lives spent in service to their country in a series of candid photos. Professionally, both Turner and Crawford were D.C.-based before semi-retirement and moving to Chestertown. They met in D.C. and spent the bulk of their careers there. Turner was a member of two White House staffs during the Reagan and Bush 41eras, was a speechwriter for Janet Reno and others of note, and followed that up with several years in the U.S. Marshal’s Service. Crawford was a special agent for the U.S. Department of State Bureau of Diplomatic Security. He was also a U.S. Foreign Service official with posts in Thailand, Algeria, Pakistan, and Saudi Arabia over the course of his career. He currently holds a part-time position with the U.S. Department of State.
The photos pop off the wall and into view not just because of their composition, but because of the color they specifically chose for the way it helps show off art. They discovered the hue called Silver Strand at the Phillips Art Collection Art Gallery in Washington.
“We wanted a gray that’s going to last longer than gray the fad,” Turner says. “We wanted a gray that’s going to be good with future things.”
Upstairs vs. Downstairs
The second and third floors provided the greatest design and “flow” challenges for Hartwig-Davis and construction, which was completed by a Chestertown-based contractor. The second floor, upon purchase, was in its original condition as a foursquare home with four smaller bedrooms on the second floor and a mostly unfinished attic on the third.
“Originally, they had a four bedroom (home) off a central hallway and a central bathroom and they very much wanted a modern master suite,” explains Hartwig-Davis. “So, we left one front bedroom as a home office intact, but then we took out the walls between the two other bedrooms, so that they have a bedroom area and a seating area.”
While one bedroom was sacrificed on the second floor, one was added to the third-floor attic space. Getting to that precious space was not easy. To do so meant taking out some load-bearing walls and adding beams for structural integrity—while always trying to maintain the character of the foursquare’s hallway, trim work, and railings. In the end, the effort would prove extremely worthwhile.
The result is a lovely guest bedroom offering peeks of the Chester River out the front window, another office space for Ran’s part-time job responsibilities, and an additional full-size bathroom with a clawfoot tub intelligently placed in a gable overlooking the home’s peaceful backyard.
What Sold Them on the House
And from what we learned, the backyard was in large part why the pair chose this particular home in the first place after initially searching for their forever home in other states and on other blocks in Chestertown.
“We were out here with our realtor and we went and looked at several houses, but nothing spoke to us, but then we were up at the bakery and someone mentioned that this one just came on the market. We walked in and kind of said, ‘Well, that’s it.’ Then, they showed us the backyard…,” Crawford says.
“The backyard sold us,” Turner adds. They loved that unlike most yards in town, theirs was not a formal English garden. While Turner says he admires English gardens, they prefer something more wooded which is what they got, and later enhanced into a wooded wonderland of sorts, with mature trees, ornamental elements, and foliage they added themselves, but the backyard’s true stunner, they said, is a 200-year-old tree.
“It’s the oldest elm in town,” Turner says with a touch of pride. And why not? Neither of them has ever had the opportunity to live in a small town before and they both seem pretty proud of being part of this one.
