Alvah Kittredge House, Roxbury MA
After collaborating on a number of projects with visionary non-profit developer Historic Boston Incorporated, including the rehab of nearby historic row houses on Fort Hill, we were thrilled to join the redevelopment team for this beloved community landmark. Talk about palimpsest – David’s HBI blog charts the transformation of this 1836 Greek Revival estate on the rural outskirts of Boston. Following an extensive Victorian expansion, the house was lifted, rotated and shoehorned on its current site in response to the new streets and housing of the flourishing city. After serving as headquarters of Roxbury Action Program from the 1970s to early 1990s, this grand old lady was abandoned, though still treasured. First step -- the James Reuben Reed mural Building a Model Black Community was painstakingly removed and donated to the National Center of Afro-American Artists. Today the elegant, newly restored Greek portico with its colossal Ionic columns, the gracious Victorian entry hall with painted glass ceiling and full-height open stairway, and floor-to-ceiling windows and high ceilings house five modern, comfortable mixed-rate apartments, one a garden apartment with private terrace, steps away from a shared garden of shrubs and groundcover.
www.historicboston.org/the-many-architects-of-the-kittredge-house
www.historicboston.org/the-kittredge-house-in-the-20th-century
