Town Topics

Georgetowner • February 7, 2012

ANC Report: Full House on DCFEMS, DCRA, Pepco, Food Trucks and Evermay.

Got all that? In an especially full and varied meeting Jan, 30, Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2E tackled a packed line-up:

**Fire & EMS**

Chief Kenneth Ellerbe, of D.C. Fire & Emergency Medical Services, fresh with his department’s safety and health demonstrations at the Georgetown Safeway Jan. 28, addressed the meeting and stressed the role of firefighters who are also paramedics and emergency responders.?Ellerbe’s insistence on the use of the full name?and not just “DCFD” (the chief ordered uniforms and t-shirts must show the full acronym, DCFEMS)? has some firemen and members of the union bothered. But the chief continues to talk about the department’s “soft presence on the streets” and the 161,000 calls in 2011: 130,000 were medical, and only 500 were real house fires. Ellerbe also said the department had gotten 25 new ambulances and defended the newly proposed firefighters’ working hours of?12 hours on, 12 off.

**Building Collapse Still Unknown**

Nicholas Majett, director of the D.C. Department of Regulatory and Consumer Affairs, talked about how the agency “touches everyone,” and then dealt with the partial collapse of the building at 1424 Wisconsin Ave., N.W., as well as regulations on the newly popular food trucks around the city. The partial collapse happening Thanksgiving Day, and there is a stop-work order on the site. The owner must hire a structural engineer to determine the cause?a possible conflict of interest that commissioners found troubling and said so to DCRA’s Bill Davidson and his boss. Citing a construction collapse of a Wisconsin Avenue building ten years ago, which was owned by the same businessman and about one block to the south, commissioner Bill Starrels recalled, “The owner has a history as a bad actor.” Owner Robert Solomon of the 1422 Wisconsin Ave. building complained about a window being bricked up. The cause of the collapse remains undetermined, and DCRA needs to know if it is to issue a permit for rebuilding at the site, which was slated to became a Z-Burger eatery.

**Where Food Trucks May Park**

As for food trucks, the commissioners voted to ask that they not park on residential streets. Current law allows them to park in any legal spot.?

**Evermay to House S&R Foundation**

Evermay’s zoning variance request was approved in a most collegial manner. Evermay LLC requested that the S&R Foundation, headed by the property’s new owners, biotech business partners and spouses Ryuji Ueno and Sachiko Kuno, be allowed to operate from the estate at R and 28th Streets with strict restrictions on frequency of events and number of employees. The foundation’s mission encourages musical and scientific excellence while it promotes American and Japanese ties and studies responses to disasters, such as tsunamis or earthquakes. S&R Foundation attorney Alice Gregg Haase listed the restrictions, which include parking all cars on Evermay’s land, no outdoor amplified music, no more than 100 persons on regular events and more. The ANC voted to review the approval after five years, not seven as was requested by the foundation. “This is the way it should work,” said ANC chair Ron Lewis. The zoning commission will make its final decision at the end of this month.

**Hey, Be Alert: Lock It**

The monthly police report by Metropolitan Police Department officer Kathryn Fitzgerald stated the obvious: lock your doors and secure your items. One business cash register was robbed when employees left keys in the register; another left its business office doors unlocked and was robbed. (The perps were caught.) As for iPhone thefts, need we say more?

**Better Wiring in the Hood**

Pepco officials were also at the meeting to discuss outages and how the utility is switching neighborhoods to different electrical grids, such as Hillandale, and upgrading lines as well?all to improve service in Burleith.

**Hang On, O and P**

For the O and P Street Project: the 3400 block of P Street should be complete now.? Check [FixingOandPStreets.com](http://www.fixingoandpstreets.com) for updates, such as a utilities turn-off next week.

Quick question: Who said the following? “Rocky’s Report should be taken with a grain of salt.” It was ANC chair Ron Lewis speaking of Georgetown University’s more personable approach to campus crime reporting.? More quotes this and next week on the zoning commission’s decision?expected momentarily?on the university’s 2010-2020 campus plan.

Caitlin White • November 3, 2011

Metro rail and bus riders can expect to see changes in terms of pricing for SmarTrip cards and paper fare cards over the next few months.

The transit agency plans to decrease the price of the SmarTrip card and increase the cost of a rail trip for users of paper fare cards in order to encourage riders to use the reusable plastic cards, the Washington Examiner reports.

SmarTrip cards will drop in price from $5 to $2.50 on Aug. 29, but Metro riders may want to consider all their fare options before purchasing one. Other changes to SmarTrip are expected in the fall.

Metro decided to reduce the SmarTrip card cost to decrease the burden on riders caused by the new fare increases, the Examiner said.

Metro initiated the first phase of fare hikes on June 27 and plans to further increase them later this summer. One such increase will be an extra 25-cent charge per rail trip for users of paper fare cards, beginning Aug. 1.

Bus riders who use cash instead of a SmarTrip card already pay a 20-cent differential. They also lose the transfer discount when switching from train to bus or bus to bus.

The transit agency will lose 90 cents on each SmarTrip card sale after the cost drops to $2.50, since it costs Metro $3.40 to make each card.

Donna Evers •

As you leave the Dupont Circle Metro station’s north exit, you will see words carved into the granite walls — lines from a poem by Walt Whitman, called “The Wound Dresser.” Since it’s hard to get the whole inscription when you are riding the escalator, here it is:

Thus in silence in dreams’ projections,
Returning, resuming, I thread my way through the hospitals;
The hurt and the wounded I pacify with soothing hand;
I sit by the restless all the dark night — some are so young,
Some suffer so much — I recall the experience sweet and sad.

This was a subject Walt Whitman knew a lot about, since he served as a volunteer nurse during the Civil War. Already known as a journalist and poet, he first got involved after the bloody Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862, where he went to take care of his brother who had been wounded in battle. There he met another impressive volunteer nurse, Clara Barton, with whom he would cross paths again in Washington. When Whitman arrived in the District to help out as a medical volunteer, the city’s public buildings were turned into crowded way stations for wounded soldiers. There were not enough doctors, and no formal nursing profession, so the military had to rely on recruits and volunteers. Even with that, doctors could not deal with the types of wounds inflicted by the advanced bullets and weapons of the war. The quickest solution to treat an infected limb — and save the soldier’s life — was to amputate. Meanwhile, the wounded were crowded into any shelters available, waiting for the meager medical help to arrive.

One of the most haunting passages in Whitman’s journal about his experiences during the war was his account of the makeshift hospital at the Old Patent Office in Washington. This building, recently restored to its original grandeur and serving as the National Portrait Gallery and Museum of American Art, made for a bizarre hospital ward. The maze of long narrow galleries was originally created to hold glass display cases, which held wood and metal models of inventions submitted for patents. Wounded soldiers, sometimes as many as 800, were laid on cots arranged alongside the glass cases, creating a path so inspectors and inventors could still get through the maze to view and judge the models, stepping over the soldiers as they moved along. This was one of many hospitals where Whitman volunteered during the war, bringing food, paper and pens for the men and sometimes just staying on so a wounded soldier would not have to die alone.

Out of these terrible experiences came some good. The war encouraged many advances in medical science. Volunteer nurse Clara Barton went on to found the American Red Cross, an organization that we rely in times of national emergencies and disasters. Meanwhile, Walt Whitman, who continued to write poetry, supported himself with a job at the Department of the Interior. Ironically, when Secretary of the Interior James Harlan discovered that Whitman was the author of “Leaves of Grass,” he fired him, citing the poems as “damaging to the morals of men.” By that time, though, Whitman was revered as a poet and supporters rallied to his cause, soon securing him another government job.
Whitman’s war experiences earned him the title “the good gray poet,” and his poems about the Civil War are forever burned into our collective memory. There are many, among them “O Captain! My Captain!”, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d” and, of course, “The Wound Dresser.” And while his words carved on the subway’s wall describe the horrors of war, they also tell about human compassion, which will always be our saving grace.
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John Blee •

The greatest antiques in Georgetown are the amazing townhouses and homes that climb the hill. A New Yorker once said to me that Georgetown is more beautiful than Greenwich Village, and indeed it is. The caretaking of Georgetown’s homes that are mostly built in the 18th, 19th, and early 20th centuries is best left to architects who respect the building, and without violating them, give them new life. Christian Zapatka, winner of the Rome Prize, is the architect today who makes the most out of re-inventing the Georgetown townhouse.

One of Zapatka’s newest re-inventions is for sale on Q and 30th Streets. This is a part of Cooke’s Row, made up of four pairs of semi-detached houses built in 1868.

Cooke’s Row has Italianate and Second Empire features, including mansard roofs. D.C.’s first governor, Henry D. Cooke, commissioned these houses. Cooke had been appointed by President Grant and belonged to the Republican political machine during the post-Civil War era.

This house had been neglected for a good while and was in need of drastic repair. What is interesting is what Zapatka left intact and what he created out of the traditional maze of bedrooms and few bathrooms. The single most amazing thing about the interior is the circular staircase that goes all the way to the third floor. It has been reinforced using its original balustrade, but with a newly invented round skylight at the top. Some of the original flooring has been retained and doors, including pocket doors, have been refinished and reused. All windows were removed and reinstalled, faking some of the original glazing when pieces were missing. An unusual feature is the slate fireplaces that were found under several layers of paint. They are polished to a dark luster.

With Zapatka in charge of the renovation everything flows; the traditional features ebb into the modern. There is never a disjunction. Because Zapatka works closely with contractors on site, he adjusts the design details on the spot. Therefore they attain certain perfection. He also employs one of the rarest of artisans: a great plasterer. Bathrooms and the kitchen are modern, created with a mastery of refined understatement.

Studying architecture with Michael Graves at Princeton and later working for him formed Zapatka’s vision. Zapatka says that Graves frequently referred to a building as a piece of furniture, or furniture as a building. Recently he attended a symposium where Graves spoke on the antiques in his house. Perhaps this is why Christian Zapatka can cull the best of an old house, at the same time renewing it.

GEORGETOWN’S ANTIQUES:

Christian Zapatka: Reinventing the Georgetown Townhouse
Frank Randolph: Interior Designer Extraordinaire
John Rosselli: Georgetown’s Antique Aficionado
Marston Luce: In Search of Elegance
Scandinavian Antiques & Living: International Accents
Susquehanna Antique Company: Redefining Tradition
Sixteen Fifty Nine: A Mid-Century Renaissance

John Blee •

Walking into Frank Randolph’s house makes you aware of what a great interior designer can do. Randolph lives in a house once occupied by Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. What he managed to do with it (not to it) is to create marvelous spaces with impeccably designed interiors. This is the hallmark of his work. All is classical, spare without being minimal and luminous.

Frank Randolph’s living room is one of the most beautiful spaces in Georgetown. It is high ceilinged, and during remodeling Randolph dropped the windows to the floor, creating real French windows. They look out onto a lovely garden below. Graced by arches, the living room contains some of the furniture Randolph has designed himself as well as a pair of 18th-century painted French screens. Small porcelain Chinese bowls and other objects are placed on tables and the mantle. He describes them all as inexpensive pieces. Randolph likes to change the arrangement every few months.

A real Washingtonian who grew up near Georgetown and attended Western High (now Duke Ellington), Randolph is the rarest of decorators, a self-taught man. The antiques that Randolph works with are mostly Swedish and Danish pieces from the 18th and 19th century. “People want to walk into a house with less of the darkness associated with antiques,” Randolph says. “They want a home to have lightness and happiness.” In his own home you can see he practices and lives with what he preaches.

“Clients don’t come to me for a strictly contemporary or modern look,” he says. “My passions are evenly divided. As an interior designer one must include things that are practical but still wonderful and beautiful. You cannot sell 19th-century chairs anymore because they break.” Randolph’s own dining room chairs are modeled on antique pieces, but in light wood and are extremely sturdy. He says that if you cannot find a piece, you can often have it reproduced.

Instinctively generous, Randolph even has a few good words to say about Martha Stewart: “I admire her way of getting the general public involved in presentation of food and of things you have in your home.”

It is rare for an architect to speak of lessons learned from a decorator. However, Georgetown architect Christian Zapatka speaks of learning from Frank Randolph and how sometimes covering a window rather than merely exposing it can create more. It is a lesson Zapatka is carrying out in his own newly designed home.

“Making people happy is rewarding,” Randolph says. “But you have to get the architecture right. Thomas Jefferson was the first American interior designer, he went to bed thinking about it and he woke up and rearranged the furniture!”

GEORGETOWN’S ANTIQUES:

Christian Zapatka: Reinventing the Georgetown Townhouse
Frank Randolph: Interior Designer Extraordinaire
John Rosselli: Georgetown’s Antique Aficionado
Marston Luce: In Search of Elegance
Scandinavian Antiques & Living: International Accents
Susquehanna Antique Company: Redefining Tradition
Sixteen Fifty Nine: A Mid-Century Renaissance

Robert Sacheli •

The lure of history and architecture has led Marston Luce into some less-than-attractive places — with some beautiful results.

In the early 1980s, he would “prowl D.C. in areas where buildings were being torn down” and he vividly recalls the rats that often scurried around as he was on the lookout for the decorative brickwork and architectural ornaments that his excursions would unearth. (“I was recycling before it was fashionable,” he chuckles. “I’m an environmentalist.”) His finds were sold from the trunk of a red MG at the Georgetown Flea Market.

Today, the stock of his eponymous upper Wisconsin Avenue shop, which opened in 2001, comes from far more congenial spots. “I do my buying in France, where I have a house in the Dordogne, and some in England and in Sweden.”

His eye, though, still is trained on the beautiful, no matter the source. He describes his aesthetic as “humble elegance.”

“I deal with very elegant things, but they have a humble soul. I like the tension between the two.” He points to an early-19th-century English bulls-eye mirror as a perfect example of that outlook. The elaborately carved frame is not gilded, the way a grander piece might be. Instead, it gets its character from a warm white finish that gives it a welcoming lightness.

Look around Luce’s airy, light-filled shop (which he shares with Dink, a Jack Russell terrier, and Penny, a schnauzer) and you’ll find tabletop arrangements that mix refined objects, folk art and furniture ranging from a Swedish comb-painted armoire to an iron table fashioned from industrial salvage from Belgium. You’ll also see charming juxtapositions, such as a 19th-century French tin weathervane in the shape of a rooster and a cement version of the same animal that sports an equally extravagant curving tail.

That sense of combination is part of a trend that Luce sees among his customers: “People are buying fewer things, but better quality, and they are mixing styles more.”

On a recent visit, a shop associate was unfolding a circa-1800 painted French screen that depicts a hunting expedition in a tropical landscape. Who knows what those long-ago gentlemen may be stalking? It might be fun to imagine that they, like Marston Luce, are on the trail of something beautiful.

Marston Luce
1651 Wisconsin Ave.
202-333-6800
www.marstonluce.com

GEORGETOWN’S ANTIQUES:

Christian Zapatka: Reinventing the Georgetown Townhouse
Frank Randolph: Interior Designer Extraordinaire
John Rosselli: Georgetown’s Antique Aficionado
Marston Luce: In Search of Elegance
Scandinavian Antiques & Living: International Accents
Susquehanna Antique Company: Redefining Tradition
Sixteen Fifty Nine: A Mid-Century Renaissance

Ari Post •

Let New York City have New Years. Chicago can keep St. Patrick’s Day. No one does the Fourth of July like Washington, D.C.

There is no venue more fitting wherein to celebrate this country’s Independence Day than the nation’s capital. July 4 celebrations in Washington are among the most attended events of the year. The National Mall, swept with national monuments and the US Capitol, is a beautiful backdrop for the city’s all-day event schedule, ending, of course, with a dazzling fireworks display over the Washington Monument.

Everyone this side of the equator knows of Washington’s infamous fireworks celebration, but there is also a wealth of activities going on throughout the day. Public access to the Mall begins at 10 a.m., so get your sunscreen and get ready.

11:45 a.m. marks the start of the Independence Day Parade, featuring marching bands, military and specialty units, floats and VIPs. Running along Constitution Avenue, the parade usually draws a sizable crowd, so get there a little early to secure a good view.

The Airmen of Note will perform at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in the Kogod Courtyard from 1 to 3 p.m. The band will play Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman and other classics from the American Big Band era. The event celebrates the opening of a related exhibit, “Telling Stories: Norman Rockwell from the Collections of George Lucas and Steven Spielberg.”

Once again, the annual Smithsonian Folklife Festival will be celebrating the cultures of all the lands that helped shape this country. Though the festival runs in two weekend segments, it culminates around the 4th. Music, food, crafts and performances will take place at this year’s event, focused on Asian Pacific Americans and the “Smithsonian, Inside Out.” Visitors are invited to look at how things work at the institution in four areas of concentration: “Unlocking the Mysteris of the Universe,” “Understanding and Sustaining a Biodiverse Planet,” “Valuing World Cultures,” and “Understanding the American Experience.” The festival also focuses on Mexico and will hold a special tribute to Haiti. The event begins at 11 a.m. and goes until 5 p.m.

The W Hotel presents Boom With A View at 7 p.m. Music will be provided by The Honey Brothers, D.S. Posner, DJ Sky Nellor, a premium open bar, hors d’oeuvres and a great view of the fireworks. The event will take place on the P.O.V. Roof Terrace and Lounge on top of the W.

The National Archives will host its traditional family programming, celebrating the signing of the Declaration of Independence. This year, NBC News National Correspondent Bob Dotson will be the MC. Including a dramatic reading of the Declaration by historical reenactors and free family activities and entertainment for all ages.

At the White House Visitor Center, National Park Service rangers and volunteers will give people the opportunity to sample the sights, sounds, activities and personages that helped finalize the Declaration of Independence. Then, at 6 p.m., the US Army Concert Band and the US Army Band Downrange will play on the southwest corner of the grounds of the Washington Monument.

Leading right up to the fireworks, a live concert by the National Symphony Orchestra and several pop artists, “A Capitol Fourth,” will perform patriotic music on the West Lawn of the Capitol Building. The concert is free and open to the public. No tickets necessary. The annual event will also be broadcast on PBS and National Public Radio on WAMU 88.5 FM.

And then, of course, the fireworks. Throughout the day, beginning in the early morning, families toting coolers and lawn chairs stake out prime real estate on the Mall’s lawn for the best views of the fireworks. And it is quite a sight. A smorgasbord of colors and light at the apex of dusk, the Capitol Building being the only other thing in sight, every dazzled eye gets lost in moments of transient patriotism. On top of the memorials lining the Mall and the US Capitol, there are other sites to enjoy the fireworks. East Potomac Park is a wonderfully fun semi-secret, and if you’re willing to ante up for tickets, the Southwest Waterfront 4th of July Festival, the Rooftop of the W Hotel, or a cruise along the Potomac River are all premier venues.

Robert Sacheli •

Enter Georgetown’s newest antiques shop, Scandinavian Antiques & Living, and you’re struck by the colorfully eclectic selection of merchandise and the warm welcome of its owner, Elisabeth Wulff Wine.

Wine, who opened her store a month ago, is a native of Denmark who spent a number of years in Milan as an art and antiques dealer and decorator before moving to Washington a year and a half ago.

Her distinctive eye is reflected in tablescapes whose elements cross the boundaries of countries and centuries. For example, one desktop display combines an 1810 bronze ormolu clock and a pair of Swedish empire candlesticks with a 1950s toilet set and a 1960s Murano glass platter in swirling pastels.

The shop’s walls, too, are home to an array of art that ranges from mid-century modern abstracts to 19th-century portraits and flower paintings.

That sense of aesthetic freedom is at the heart of Wine’s shop: “Today we mix antiques with other objects,” she says. “A home today does not have to be the same — there are so many possibilities.”

Swedish furniture forms the centerpiece of the store’s collection, and Wine is understandably fond of its distinctive style. “I love the Swedish look. It’s so simple and so elegant. And it looks nice to mix it.”

One of her favorite pieces is a Gustavian clock cabinet, a drop-front secretary topped with a clock framed in soft curves. (The Gustavian style takes its name from a late 18th-century Swedish monarch.) More graceful curves characterize a standing clock, whose case has been weathered to a beautiful pale turquoise since it was made in 1750, and Wine has chosen it for her shop’s logo.

There’s an elegant sense of femininity to much of the shop’s stock, such as a fanciful Italian crystal-beaded chandelier in the shape of a pagoda (perfect for a fabric-tented boudoir, perhaps) and sensuously shaped Murano glass torchieres. Along with objects such as vivid Murano glass vases from the middle of the last century, these play off the pastel tones and neoclassical lines of the Scandinavian furniture to create a lively, unexpected harmony.

It’s exactly that sense of personal expression that Wine emphasizes as she sums up her outlook on décor: “People’s own taste is very important, even when working with a decorator. That’s what makes a home very personal.”

Scandinavian Antiques & Living
3231 P St.
202-450-5894

GEORGETOWN’S ANTIQUES:

Christian Zapatka: Reinventing the Georgetown Townhouse
Frank Randolph: Interior Designer Extraordinaire
John Rosselli: Georgetown’s Antique Aficionado
Marston Luce: In Search of Elegance
Scandinavian Antiques & Living: International Accents
Susquehanna Antique Company: Redefining Tradition
Sixteen Fifty Nine: A Mid-Century Renaissance