Real Estate Spotlight

Who Lives Here: Mika Brzezinski and Scott Altman

Peter Murray • September 10, 2014

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Georgetowners may notice “Morning Joe” co-host Mika Brzezinski strolling through the neighborhood in the coming days and weeks. The popular media personality just bought a condo in what used to be the Phillips School between N and Olive Streets. While her show is based in New York and she and her family currently live there, she purchased property here as “Morning Joe” has become increasingly focused on politics in the nation’s capitol. D.C.’s thriving real estate market could have also influenced the purchase. Alexander Memorial Baptist Church is next up on the list of old properties being converted into condo units. Maybe Mika will convince friend and co-host Joe Scarborough to become a neighbor.

If you wander a block north of Mika’s place, you’ll pass a house where retired NASA astronaut Scott Altman lives with his wife, Jill. They temporarily live near the corner of 28th and Dumbarton Streets while they await a move back to the west side, where their house on 36th Street is being redone. Altman piloted or commanded four space shuttle missions. Years before, he got to fly his F-14 in the movie, “Top Gun,” which he admits was a real kick since the pilots were allowed to “buzz the tower” at the Miramar Air Station in San Diego. The two are active in the community and regularly volunteer at the Georgetown Senior Center.

Around the corner from the Altmans, several neighbors routinely walk their dogs past the intersection of 27th and O Streets, where a black SUV or sedan sits continually at the corner. Questions have arisen among local residents as to who is living in the neighborhood with a security detail. Things became slightly clearer last year when anti-war group Code Pink demonstrated on neighborhood streets. Well, suffice it to say, Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson and his family live nearby. Johnson was sworn in to his current role at the end of 2013 but has lived in Georgetown for a number of years.
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Remodeling for Modern Life

Corrie Dyke • July 2, 2014

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John and Kristin Cecchi’s life could be a reality TV show. But it wouldn’t involve cameras following them to Peacock Cafe or Fiola Mare. HGTV would hit closer to home, since John is a real estate developer. The 39-year-old, soon to turn 40, has renovated eight houses in Georgetown, the neighborhood where he and Kristin reside.

“Georgetown seems to be what’s in,” John said. “It’s the ‘it’ place.”

After John’s father, Giuseppe Cecchi, built the Watergate, considered D.C.’s first mixed-use development, he started IDI Group Companies. John began working for IDI after college in 1996, first in customer service.

Making his way up through the ranks, by 2008, John was named vice president and project manager of an IDI project in Alexandria. (The project was shelved due to the declining market and economy.) At the same time, he was building his own home on P Street in Georgetown. It was then that he realized there was a market for restoring and renovating historic homes.

John launched IDI Residential, a division of IDI Group Companies, in 2008. “I figured it out late,” John said. “I should have been doing this since ’96.”

His most recently finished project, 2305 Bancroft Place in Kalorama, was John’s first house outside Georgetown and the first celebrated with an opening party.

“The first time we decided to tell people what we were doing, it went big,” John said of Bancroft – a Washington Post house of the week that also appeared in Home & Design magazine.

“We like to stay hush-hush about our houses. Just build them, renovate them and sell them,” he said.

Historically, Kalorama has been D.C.’s wealthy neighborhood: bigger yards, bigger homes. The elegance of embassies and black cars makes you feel like you’re in an important place, John said.

“It’s one class of people, where in Georgetown you have your $8 million house next to two college kids.”

Doing a house in Kalorama takes patience, according to John, who is currently renovating another house in the neighborhood. “It’s not so volatile of a market, but things do sell there and second only to Georgetown in the area. It’s not the village feel that Georgetown has.”

Back in Georgetown, John has renovated two houses on P Street (with work on a third about to begin), two on Dumbarton, one on 31st and two on N, plus the N Street Condominiums.

Three homes a year is a good pace, according to John, who describes his business as taking a great house with unrealized potential and working through the Advisory Neighborhood Commission and the Old Georgetown Board to make renovations and sometimes additions.

“I try to work within the walls and create a better space.”

John and Kristin are currently renting their house on N Street, where John took a deteriorating home and made it livable in a mere 26 days.

“It looked like a haunted house that should have been condemned,” Kristin said. “The ceiling was crumbling. It was in disrepair.”

John asked for 26 days to whip the house into shape.

“Not my kind of finished product, but I did a very heavy lipstick,” John said.

Like an episode of “House Hunters Renovation,” the couple sanded, scraped, painted and fixed up all the rough, superficial parts of the house. “We even had the appropriate arguments,” said Kristin.

They added carpet and painted the wood floors white. John changed the upstairs layout, turning a bedroom into Kristin’s closet. Kristin picked out all new light fixtures. They hung artwork from around the world on the large white walls.

The couple moved to N Street in December of 2013 with their five-month-old daughter Valentina and two-and-a-half-year-old son Antonio in tow.

“It’s not as perfect as our old one, on P Street,” Kristin said. “That house was such a jewel, but after kids it was like a tight pair of designer pants.”

“Now we’re in a pair of sweatpants,” John said. “It’s comfortable.”
Around the time they moved into their home, John purchased another house on N Street to renovate.

“John is so artistic,” Kristin said. “These are like art projects to him. I joke that he has laser beams in his head. He walks in a house, scans the room and sees everything in his head. He gets these end results that are absolutely beautiful, but there has to be a profit at the end of the day.”

The whole process is envisioning the end product, Kristin says. “It’s a big guessing game, but the more we do it the better business we produce.”

The guiding principle is to adapt a house’s layout to the way people live today. That generally means a formal space in the front of the house and an open floor plan in the back – for the kitchen and an informal dining and breakfast area.

Sometimes a complete overhaul of the second level and master suite is needed to update the home. The all-important master suite encompasses a his-and-hers walk-in closet, a large bathroom with a toilet closet, a double vanity, a soaking tub and a rain shower.

John’s goal is to preserve a home’s historic charm while updating the design and layout and adding state-of-the-art systems. Working with contractors and interior designers, John’s homes are staged and finished to perfection before selling – that is, if they can stay on the market that long. All of the N Street condos were sold before they were finished. John says that the houses he renovates in Georgetown typically sell in 45 days or less.

“Each house has its own little story,” John said. “From when you purchase it, what you find when you start gutting it and what it turns out to be, there are parts that you didn’t expect to surprise you.”

Transforming Georgetown’s storied homes, one day the Cecchis just might find a camera crew on their doorstep. [gallery ids="101796,140741,140717,140722,140743,140728,140733,140737" nav="thumbs"]

Featured Property

Georgetowner • June 18, 2014

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This Federal-style house – one of the most historic in the District – was built in 1798 on the northeast corner of Prospect and 35th Streets. Sold 10 years ago by Sen. Clairborne Pell and his wife Nuala to Ralph and Nancy Taylor, it has had many owners who were active in local and national affairs.

Offered at $11,000,000

TTR Sotheby’s International Reality
Russell Firestone
202-333-1212
russell.firestone@sothebysrealty

The Auction Block

Georgetowner • June 4, 2014

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Doyle New York

Mexican Sterling Silver Tea Service

Auction Date: June 25

Estimate: $4,000 to $6,000

An important design resource, Doyle at Home auctions offer an endless diversity of stylish furniture, elegant decorations and attractive works of art from prominent estates and collections across the country. These auctions have also become popular venues for the sale of property from designers’ own collections. Among the array of options at the upcoming Doyle at Home auction is this elegant Mexican sterling silver tea service.

Bonhams

James Edward Buttersworth, (1817-1894)

“The America’s Cup Yacht Vigilant”

Oil on canvas

Auction Date: June 25

Estimate: $200,000 to $300,000

Bonhams’ Fine Maritime Paintings & Decorative Arts auction on June 25 will feature master paintings of the genre, along with artifacts and crafts from centuries of Eastern and Western maritime traditions: old model ships, merchant logbooks, even a scrimshaw walrus dusk depicting a whaling scene. The wide array of paintings includes beautiful smaller works by lesser-known artists and larger pieces by such masters as Montague Dawson, John Mecray and the legendary James Edward Buttersworth.

Freeman’s

Édouard Leon Cortès (1882–1969)

“Place St. Michel”

Oil on canvas?
Auction Date: June 17?
Estimate: $20,000 to $30,000?
As part of their European Art and Old Masters auction, Freeman’s will feature this mesmerizing, atmospheric French street scene by French Post-Impressionist Édouard Leon Cortès. Cortès was known as “Le Poete Parisien de la Peinture,” or “the Parisian Poet of Painting,” because of his Paris cityscapes in a variety of weather and night settings. Here, the reflection of the urban commotion from the wet cobblestone street on this glowing, rainy day lights up one’s sense of history. Other works include a maritime painting by Montague Dawson and the Turner-esque port scenes of Francis Moltino.

Sotheby’s

Louis XV Ormolu-Mounted Chinese Lacquer Commode, c. 1745

Auction Date: June 9

Estimate: $150,000 to $250,000

In addition to a selection of important English and European furniture and decorations from the Baroque to the late Neoclassical periods, this Sotheby’s sale will feature ceramics, works of art from across Europe and Oriental and European rugs and carpets. Among the highlights are a fine Louis XV ormolu-mounted gilt and black japanned commode and a rare Louis XV ormolu-mounted ebonized cartonnier clock attributed to Charles Cressent.

Historic D.C.

Donna Evers • May 21, 2014

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The only two cities with more period apartment houses than the District of Columbia are Chicago and New York. Considering the District’s relative size, it is a genuine gold mine of these historic buildings.

James Goode meticulously catalogued them in his great book “Best Addresses,” and while there are dozens of architecturally noteworthy buildings, the height of their golden age came at the very beginning, from 1890 to 1918.

The most influential of these early buildings still standing is the Cairo at 1615 Q St., NW. Built in 1894 by gifted young architect T. Franklin Schneider, this fanciful, Moorish-inspired creation was the tallest, and probably the biggest, residential building in Washington. It drew heavy criticism for its style, its size and, most of all, its height. Firemen couldn’t get near the top in case of fire and mischievous residents would drop pebbles from the roof garden to the street below, scaring the horses pulling carriages.

The Cairo single-handedly brought about the 1894 building height regulations, which are in place to this day and make Washington the only major U.S. city to have kept its low skyline, a characteristic cherished by Washingtonians.

Our great apartment buildings are a product of the City Beautiful Movement that emerged from the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair. The temporary “White City” in the great exposition was filled with inspiring examples of classic Beaux-Arts architecture created by Americans fresh from the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Their devotion to classicism was complete, and visitors who saw the gleaming “city” were enchanted.

Meanwhile, the McMillan Commission in Washington decided it was time to complete Pierre L’Enfant’s great plan for the city, building the grand boulevards and classic buildings that would complement the White House and the Capitol. Enter the architects fresh from Paris and Chicago, who were ready, willing and able to design the great public buildings – as well as grand apartment houses for the white-collar workers moving to Washington to fill the ranks of the expanding federal government. The makings of a real estate success story were at hand.

The list of architects and apartment buildings is truly monumental, but here are a few favorites:

James G. Hill designed the Mendota and the Ontario, and T. Franklin Schneider went on to add an incredible list to his achievements, including the Iowa, the Albemarle, the Farragut, the Cecil, the Burlington, the Woodley, the Rochambeau, California House and California Court. Three of these fabulous buildings were razed in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Jules de Sibour mastered Beaux-Arts techniques with the Warder (razed in 1958) and the McCormick Apartment Building, which until recently housed the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

We can thank B. Stanley Simmons for the design of the Wyoming on Columbia Road and Arthur B. Heaton for the Altamont. The architectural firm of Hunter and Bell was responsible for 2029 Connecticut Ave., NW, and Albert Beers designed the Northumberland and the unique Dresden, which perfectly fits its commanding site on the corner of Kalorama Road and Connecticut Avenue.

It was very fortunate that classical architecture had its renaissance at the same time that the federal government decided to promote the massive reconstruction of our city, making L’Enfant’s visionary design – of more than a century before – a stunningly beautiful reality.

Donna Evers, devers@eversco.com, is the owner and broker of Evers & Co. Real Estate, the largest woman-owned and woman-run real estate firm in the Washington metro area, and the proprietor of historic Twin Oaks Tavern Winery in Bluemont, Va.

86th Annual Garden Tour, May 10

Georgetowner • May 7, 2014

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The 86th annual Georgetown Garden Tour – presented by the Georgetown Garden Club, an affiliate of the Garden Club of America – will take place this Saturday, May 10, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. This year’s chair is Liz Evans. Ticket holders set their own pace, visiting the featured gardens in any order and enjoying afternoon tea, including light refreshments made and served by Club members.

There are a total of nine gardens this year. According to Barbara Downs, publicity chair, the “showpieces of the garden tour” are the Pyne garden on 30th Street and the Bradlee and Crocker gardens around the corner.

Tickets are $35 and may be purchased online at georgetowngardentour.com or on Saturday at Christ Church, 31st and O Sts., NW, or at any of the tour sites. The tea, in the church’s Keith Hall, will be served from 2 to 4 p.m. There is also a garden boutique where Haitian linens, handwoven silk textiles, vases, pots, statuary and other garden-related items will be sold.

All proceeds from the tour are returned to Georgetown in the form of maintenance and beautification of its parks, green spaces and trees. In addition, funds go to support the Student Conservation Association at Dumbarton Oaks Park, which trains at-risk youth to remove invasive plants and carry out other horticultural work.

The 2014 Georgetown House Tour, APRIL 26

Robert Devaney •

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1689 34th St., NW

This house and the surrounding townhouses on 34th Street and Reservoir Road were built around 1951 on the site of the extensive gardens and pool of Friendship House, the last of the large estates owned by Evalyn Walsh McLean, heiress and socialite. McLean is best known as the last private owner of the 44.5-carat Hope Diamond, now on exhibit at the Museum of Natural History.

This brick, colonial-style, semi-detached home has four levels. The current owners purchased it in 1998, when they combined households from England, South Africa and Virginia. They immediately embarked on a series of renovations allowing for a more open floor plan, finished the top floor, upgraded the carriage house and, most recently, renovated the original 1951 kitchen in the English basement. Almost all of the main floor and lower level is the owners’ design. Much of the built-in cabinetry and furniture in the basement was handmade by them. The mature wisteria, planted in 1998, was the owners’ first addition to the garden. The carriage house is an architectural gem and serves as the guest room of first resort.

2906 P St., NW

This charming house, on a large lot set back from the street, was originally built sometime between 1844 and 1865, when the frame structure that forms the heart of the house (a double parlor on the first floor and two second-floor bedrooms) was erected. Sometime later, a rear addition was built, comprising the kitchen on the first floor and an additional bedroom suite on the second floor. During the 1960s, the house underwent a major renovation, which included altering the curved stairs in the main part of the house and an addition to the front at the west side of the property to include a garage, an indoor pool and a second-floor artist studio connected by a spiral staircase.

The current owners purchased the property in 1999 and later began another major renovation within the existing footprint to expand the kitchen, open up several smaller rooms and add the back staircase and French doors leading to the side and rear gardens. The renovation, designed by architect Outerbridge Horsey and executed by contractor John Richardson, transformed the indoor pool room into a family room and added a lower-level playroom to accommodate the family’s three children.

3102 P St., NW

The current homeowners purchased the house four years ago, when they moved to Georgetown from New York. They removed walls on the lower level to create a small theater room for family movie-watching and redid the lower foyer with blue slate flooring and white beadboard cubbies to accommodate the sporting activities of their four children.

Outside, notice that the bay window that matched those of the three neighboring houses was removed in the 1980s so that the garage could be added. In the entryway is a striking green and white Kelly Wearstler wallpaper. The Lucite waterfall console table coupled with the faux-bamboo mirror maximizes the use of the narrow space.

3141 O St., NW

This distinguished townhouse, built between 1957 and 1959, was once the home of F. Joseph Donohue, a District Commissioner from 1951 to 1953. The site dates back to the early 19th century, when it was a livery stable on what was then Beall Street, a few doors down from the legendary Connecticut-Copperthite Pie Baking Company on the corner of today’s Wisconsin Avenue and O Street.

The current owner has renovated the house, aspiring to “take the 1960s out of the house” and “create the ambience of a Paris apartment,” she said. The exterior is a contemporary adaptation of the Federal architectural style. The offset door, a departure from rigid Federal symmetry, allows for a modern necessity: a full-size garage. The spacious garden was completely redesigned for LB Design by local landscape architects Fritz & Gignoux. It has been nearly doubled in size by converting what used to be a back alley into a croquet lawn with an attractive water fountain and a stone seating area.

3254 O St., NW

This detached residence sits on a large lot that includes a detached brick carriage house at the back. The property was first conveyed in 1770 to Caspar Shaff. The original structure was built in the 1830s. Subsequent owners included both George and William Beall, who bought it in 1841 for $10 and sold it in 1853 to the Vestry of St. John’s Church for $100. In 1860, the house was enlarged by the creation of the front living room and a formal Federal façade was added in front. Notice the mounting block outside the front gate and the original ironwork stairs.

The current owner is an architectural and interior designer and real estate agent. She has spent the past 15 years improving and updating her home while preserving its many period details, such as the original heart-of-pine, random-width planked floors. The entryway suggests coziness, but the house is actually of substantial size with multiple bedrooms and a lower-level guest suite that offers a serene garden view.

The owner just completed a major renovation of the combined kitchen and family room. With the addition of three more sets of French doors, the kitchen area has been transformed into a more open floor plan to unify the kitchen, family room, brick patio and garden. The dining space, with its Pembroke drop-leaf table and English Chippendale armchairs, affords a splendid view over the manicured, southern-facing garden with its circular brick pathway and dramatic weeping willow tree.

3417 P St., NW

Think of 3417 P Street as two independent structures combined into a single home. The heart of the residence, to the east, was build in 1852 as a carriage house and stables by William Herron, a local contractor, to serve his large 35th Street home (seen on previous house tours). In 1951, Wesley Steele, acclaimed organist for St. John’s Church in Lafayette Square, purchased the carriage house and later added to the property, building the two-story guest house and garden area. The house was featured in the 1967 Georgetown House Tour, when visitors were invited to inspect Steele’s personal pipe organ. A sensitive recent renovation, overseen by the current owner and architect Dale Overmeyer, restored beams in the living room, moved the kitchen to the garden level by the pool, re-landscaped the garden and created a harmonious flow, the better to integrate the two structures into one home.

Approaching from the east along P Street, note the original carriage doors and well-preserved brick carriage tracks. By the entrance stands a massive antique Italian door, where a flight of flagstone stairs ascends to the living level of the house. From the garden, look up and to the right to see the outlines of the original carriage house and two subsequent additions. The garden is unusually large for Georgetown. Walk past the pool to the upper terrace to take a look at the dining area secluded under a magnolia tree near the soothing fountain. Because the garden is effectively above and protected from the street level, little traffic noise reaches here.

3413 P St., NW

This house’s bright yellow brick and deep green shutters cannot be missed as one walks along P Street. Behind this facade lies an appealing private garden spanning the entire side of the house and offering seclusion from the public street. This garden was among those featured in Adrian Higgins’s 1994 book, “Secret Gardens of Georgetown.” Glass-paneled doors along the side of the house give one the feeling of living in the garden. The layout of the house is linear, the front room being the living room, behind which the hall provides the entryway from the garden. Next comes the dining room and kitchen, with a doorway to the rear of the garden.

For all that comfort has been the owners’ top priority, on display in the house are many antiques, interesting and unusual objects and family heirlooms. These include paintings by Mr. Knight’s great-grandfather, Daniel Ridgway Knight (1839-1924), and grandfather, Louis Aston Knight (1873-1948). The frames that hold these artists’ paintings have been expertly restored by Bill Adair. Mrs. Knight is herself a talented and accomplished artist.
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3026 Q St., NW

This grand four-story mansion, built around 1850, has passed through many hands since it was first sold in 1871 for $4,500. The property was added to during the early 1970s, when land was excavated to create a garage and driveway (something much coveted in Georgetown), and the rear gardens were replaced by a 15-foot-wide swimming pool. The present owner has narrowed the pool to make way for a terrace for entertaining and outdoor reading, a particular passion of the owner, who has made sunny reading nooks on all four levels, both inside and out.

The house is full of fine original millwork, particularly near the entrance. A sumptuous archway frames the staircase and hall, which leads to the kitchen overlooking the pool. Note the dark oak hardwood floors throughout and the owner’s choice of an impressive if unusual palette of blue and purple, intended to convey an air of serenity. While the 1970s addition is restrained in appearance, the double-high dining room with skylights is spectacular. Visible through the glass atrium, a star magnolia and a weeping cherry soften the more modern rear exterior.

1530 Wisconsin Ave., NW(The George Town Club)

The George Town Club is an elegant city dining club providing a warm retreat for its members, with fine cuisine, privacy and friendly, gracious service. Formed in 1966, the club brings together leaders from the business, professional, social, philanthropic, political, social, cultural, academic and diplomatic sectors.

The club occupies 18th-century frame buildings. Club founders extensively renovated the run-down historic building, adding the brick entryway, excavating the lower level and importing European wood paneling. The wrought-iron work by Samuel Yellin was rescued from the demolition of the original Morgan Guaranty Trust Company building in New York. Over time, two adjacent brick townhouses were incorporated into the club premises.

On the second floor, the extraordinary oak paneling in the main dining room was created in the style of Robert Adam, England’s premier architect in the late 1700s. At either end of the sideboard are large fishing-vessel figureheads, framing a leaded-glass demilune that was originally a feature of J. P. Morgan’s private office.

In the past year, the interiors of the club’s main-floor rooms have been substantially updated, preserving historical architectural features. Light sisal floor coverings have replaced the worn dark rugs, and some parts of the walls have been upholstered in a light neutral linen fabric to offset the extensive dark wood paneling. The most dramatic change has been the complete renovation of the Grill Room. The updating of the club’s decor was a collaboration of interior designers Andrew Law and Debbie Winsor, both Georgetown residents and club members.

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