Condo tuned up near Symphony Hall LIVING ROOM
HOT PROPERTY
In this city, especially in the tightly packed streets of its oldest downtown neighborhoods, the best place to find good views is usually up on row house roof decks or the top floors of the taller buildings.
But at this newly renovated condo at 17 Cumberland St., just a couple of blocks from Symphony Hall, you only have to look out the second-story bay windows to get spectacular views of the Back Bay — including scenes of richly detailed brick Victorians of the Saint Botolph area, with the Prudential towering in the background.
“It’s exposed from three different angles, so you have some more space,” said developer Koby Kempel, CEO of Pegasus Luxury Homes, when explaining why the two-level condo has such great vistas.
The home, which takes up the top two floors of this historic three-story row house, also has a roof deck, offering more awesome city scenes, including of the Christian Science Mother Church. The place just went on the market around Christmas for $3.5 million.
Though the building was built in 1888 by architect James E. Potter — a familiar name on this picturesque street off Huntington Avenue — it’s been completely gutted on the inside into a blindingly bright, white modern dwelling.
“When I do a gut rehab on a brownstone all that I leave are the bricks on the walls. …
I replace everything,” said Kempel, which in this case included ripping out old plumbing, electrical wiring, and all else behind the walls. But the work also included adding what wasn’t there before: more light and windows. Because zoning regulations forbid Kempel from adding height to the low-rise building, he instead built it out, creating essentially an angular six-window bay on the rear of the building, echoing the classic, curvy three-window bays on the front.
The condo’s first level on the second story of the building is basically a large hall with the living room in front and the contemporary kitchen in the center with a slick gray quartz island acting as a bar table, countertop and divider from the rear dining area that has glass doors leading to the back balcony.
Upstairs completes the 2,339-square-foot home, with three bedrooms, including the large frontfacing master with its own window bay. A study is at the rear, and it could almost be considered a sunroom with its 6-window bay that during a tour on Wednesday afternoon was flooded with white sunlight.
Virtually all the bathrooms — there are two and a half — have fine stone tiles, such as marble, and contemporary sink fixtures. While the place is modern in design, there are some echoes of classic details, such as flat, streamlined crown moldings and two handsome gas fireplaces.
“My passion is restoring old buildings,” said Kempel, but, “here there was nothing that was original that was left in here.”
Yet, he said, here and there he put in some of the traditional-themed architectural elements. “After all,” he said, “we are in Boston.”
The sale of the home — and the downstairs condo listed for just over $3 million — is being handled by Michael Harper of Coldwell Banker, 617-480-3938.