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The renovation of this classic Greenwich Village town house was a delicate balancing act—weighing the push of historical preservation against the pull of contemporary inspiration. The structure was built in 1915 as a single-family residence and then converted into a multifamily dwelling; when my clients purchased the house, it was divided into ten apartments. Peter Pennoyer Architects, our partner in the transformation process, was tasked with restoring the house to its original purpose as a single-family home, replete with traditional moldings and paneling, fluted columns on the parlor floor, and a stunning central staircase. Our goal for both the architecture and the interiors was to pay homage to the house’s period roots without capitulating to a dry, orthodox exercise in historical literalism. The renovation was not only a labor of love but also a setting for it: my clients were married at the construction site. The polyglot language of the reconceived interiors is announced immediately in the entryway, where we combined a John Dickinson console with large-scale foliate Danish sconces from the 1940s, a midcentury French chandelier, and a painting by George Condo.

The continental sensibility expands into the main social spaces on the parlor floor. In the living room,we tempered the formality of the architectural backdrop with sofas covered in an alluring Klein-blue velvet, and custom seating with poured-glass legs, an impressive seven-foot-long vintage Arredoluce chandelier, and a carpet and fire screen with a matching pattern drawn from an antique table. In the dining room, a sculptural Silas Seandel metal dining table with Paul Evans chairs is positioned off-center, juxtaposed with a custom corner banquette that has become a favorite lounging spot for the homeowners and their friends. On the upper floors, variations in color, texture, and materials conspire to give the individual rooms their own distinct identities. The walls of the third-floor library are painted with a faux-bois treatment in a pale gray driftwood tone. The media room on the same level is sheathed in mauve velvet for a cozy, cloistering effect. In the moody primary bedroom, we covered the walls and bed frame in a purplish-gray felt, which we also used for the curtains. Throughout the house, decorative flourishes both playful and glamorous, and a continuously evolving art collection, leaven the seriousness of the architecture, conjuring an environment anchored in the past but animated by an exuberant contemporary spirit.

Project Notes