CRAFTSMAN
Woodworker and his wife find lighter side of Arts & Crafts
Dark wood in a dark room in often dark Pittsburgh does not make for a cheerful place. Yet Dan and Kathy Deis made it work.
The couple had always loved the richly stained, strong-grained woodwork associated with Stickley’s Craftsman style, but the threestory North Side row house they bought in 2000 had no side windows. In fact it had no interior at all after a fire destroyed almost everything but the stone and brick walls.
They hired an architect who designed a beautiful Craftsman interior with a price as rich as the woodwork. Undaunted, the couple turned to Horn Corp., a contractor that worked with the couple to translate their Arts & Crafts vision into a light, bright dream home with crisp white woodwork, calm colors and period furniture, artwork, accents and fixtures.
It will be one of 11 stops on the 49th annual Mexican War Streets House and Garden Tour on Sept. 9.
“Woodworking has always been a hobby,” said Mr. Deis, a retired physicist who worked for Westinghouse and Honeywell.
He designed and built mantels for three gasburning fireplaces, a chest of drawers and ornate trunks for his two daughters and two granddaughter. He also stripped and rebuilt several doors that survived the fire and the paneled staircase wall on the first floor. He even traveled to Auburn, Maine, to work with Thos. Moser Cabinet Makers on a cherry rocker.
His wife is not as handy, but she is every bit as skilled and diligent in sourcing lighting, materials and fixtures for their 1894-built house.
“This house has 50-60 light fixtures,” Mr. Deis said. “Every outlet, every cabinet she spent days picking out.”
“The wall of cabinets in the kitchen came from a magazine picture I carried around for years,” she said.
Horn Corp. carpenters installed the massive piece in front of a chimney, giving the Deises a mixture of shallow and deep cabinets. The kitchen also has granite and solid-surface counter tops, two Fisher & Paykel DishDrawers, a GE Advanium microwave/convection oven and a dual-fuel Kenmore oven.
In addition to Craftsman-style room dividers, the living and dining rooms feature reproduction two-blade Emerson fans, Van Briggle Pottery vases and period artwork, including a restruck 1905 poster by Alphonse Mucha. Framesmith in Squirrel Hill crafted its complementary wood frame.
House tour regulars might remember this house from 2003, when the year-long construction project was finished just in time for the tour. Mr. Deis was still working then. He and his wife had returned to Pittsburgh for the second time after jobs in California and New Jersey.
The first two times, they lived in Forest Hills and Churchill. Their daughter, who lives in a house of the same vintage a block away, lured them to the North Side. He retired about five years ago from his job, but not from his hobby.
The couple has extended their Craftsman aesthetic to the back deck, enclosing it and turning it into a three-season room with skylights and large windows that also brighten the adjacent kitchen. It’s the perfect place to read the morning newspaper or enjoy a glass of wine on a summer evening, Mr. Deis said.
Passersby sometimes remark on two words that appear on the front window of the house: retirement and renacimiento. The Deises chose them during the 2014 “River of Words” project sponsored by City of Asylum and the Greater Pittsburgh Arts Council. What is the meaning of the Spanish word, a visitors asks.
“Renaissance,” Mr. Deis said. “Or starting over.”