Vision for an unloved listing

I love houses.

This may be self-evident given what I do, but I mean, I love houses. My mom’s family are all House People. Growing up, we used to go to Twin Cities Parade of Homes and other house tours as a fun weekend activity. My brothers and I would pick out our rooms (and sometimes fight over who got what.) When I bought my first apartment in Brooklyn, I looked at at least 100, burning through many brokers along the way. When we moved back to Minneapolis, we looked at 50 places in two weekends. I know at base a house is simply a container for our lives, but I can’t help but think that container is not neutral, but influential in the kind of life we will live between its walls. Looking at real estate is all about the possibilities.

Which may be why, though I have no intention of moving, I find myself searching the MLS a couple of times a year. My favorite thing to do, once I’ve checked certain micro-pockets that I love for location + style of housing stock, is to search properties over a million dollars, built before, oh, 1978, that have been parked on the market for months. These are the homes with interesting bones that many of today’s consumers can’t quite see past.

In our interior design work, we always say a project has three voices: yours, ours, and the houses. With no specific client in the mix, I like to look at these forlorn houses and ask, what does this house want? What does it need?

Here’s an example.

This house in Saint Louis Park, Minnesota (MLS 6473048) was built in 1957 and looks like it has a renovation sometimes in the 80s.

There are some pretty interesting elements and I would hate to see the whole home gutted. The kitchen has some deco-inspired curves and there are other curved walls, some of glass block. I can see how most homeowners just see a giant, expensive project, but I would embrace these specific elements and lean in to furniture with tailored, sculptural, deco lines. As is, the house is a bit cold and slick, with hard materials, harsh lighting, and mostly cool tones. This house wants warmth! The slick surfaces need some craggy texture for counterpoint. Wool, velvet, burl, glazed pottery, linen, leather-wrapped tables….warmth with a side of sex appeal.

Feels good, right?

I WOULD be prepared to gut the bathrooms and update the architectural lighting and some of the flooring materials. But this place has some cool bones, it could just use a new vision!

What do you think: could you embrace the bossy elements?