Kasey Kennedy and her husband, Jack, grew up in Pittsburgh, so a love for the city’s turn-of-the-century vernacular architecture is as much a part of their DNA as rooting for the Steelers. For them, living in a modern-day McMansion is about as likely as becoming Ravens fans.
In 2001, they moved from a Tudor-style house in Brighton Heights -- designed in the 1920s by Benno Janssen and previously owned by Steelers chairman Dan Rooney— to something with a bit more space that they could share with Mrs. Kennedy’s younger brother, Gregory Cole.
Now the house they renovated to accommodate their tastes and Mr. Cole’s wheelchair is one of seven that will be open Dec. 5 for the Ben Avon Holiday House Tour. The oldest house dates to the early 1860s; the newest is a stone Dutch Colonial built in 1923 and featuring an M.P. Moller pipe organ with 328 pipes purchased from the Benedictine monastery in Observatory Hill. Tourgoers also will get to visit the former St. Anthony’s Priory, which recently underwent a $1.2 million renovation project to become the new home for a marketing and design firm.
Mr. Cole, who was disabled in an accident at age 16, had a single-level house in mind when he was house hunting with his sister. “But this is Pittsburgh,” says Mrs. Kennedy, who works as an English teacher at Pittsburgh High School for the Creative and Performing Arts.
So they settled on a three-story, century-old house they loved with wide doorways and that would fit an ADA-accessible elevator. The Dutch Colonial Revival was built in 1913 and boasts a striking red-tile gambrel roof and gracious front entry. Best of all, it had space off the kitchen where architect Susan Tusick could put an elevator without drastically changing the home’s footprint.
The house also features a “man cave” for Mr. Cole in the basement, a gourmet kitchen with separate cooking and entertaining areas (and radiant heat floors) and a living room so serene it practically begs you to pull out a book and start reading.
One of their first projects was removing the knotty pine paneling surrounding a big stone fireplace in the living room, and replacing its modern enclosure with something more traditional. “Jack took a crowbar to that right off the bat,” says Mrs. Kennedy.
They replaced faux stained-glass windows in the front door and first-floor landing with the real things from Williams Stained Glass in Castle Shannon. The new owners also replaced the carpeting on the stairs with an Oriental runner, refinished the original oak floors, painted all of the woodwork and with interior designer Nancy Drew’s help, added colorful wallpaper in the hall and dining rooms.
The Kennedys have an affinity for illustrative art, so some of the first things you notice are the many framed lithographs and antique prints lining the walls. Above Inuit pottery on the living room mantel — one of four working fireplaces in the house — George Cruikshank’s cautionary 1847 cartoon “The Bottle” tells the disastrous tale of alcoholism in eight plates.
In the hall, above a carved gentleman’s traveling liquor cabinet that Mrs. Kennedy bought at a Texas estate sale, is an engraving of Chaucer’s Canterbury pilgrims. Upstairs in a guest room, an entire wall is devoted to prints of albatrosses, including a teeny-tiny collector’s card depicting the seabird on a British cigarette package.
Mr. Cole’s basement getaway has a more modern vibe, with leather couches, a cowhide rug and a red-felted pool table. Yet it also embraces the home’s past, with a bar area where Mr. Cole reimagined an old root cellar. Glassware, bottles and other items are now displayed and stored in or on bins and shelves that once held fruits, vegetables and preserves. If you look closely, you can still see the names of the preserves that were stored on the wood shelves.
The house also features two side porches for entertaining and people-watching. Many former residents have stopped by to visit, says Mrs. Kennedy, including one man who recalled how he used to dance on the porch.
“Everyone has such great memories of this house,” she says.
From the minute the Kennedys and Mr. Cole moved in, there was no denying it had good mojo.
“I could just feel it was a friendly house,” she says, “and a happy house.”
Gretchen McKay: gmckay@post-gazette.com, 412-263-1419 or on Twitter @gtmckay.
First Published: November 25, 2015, 3:07 p.m.