The subdivision eventually became what exists today: One renovated farmhouse, six new houses, and two lots that may or may not be built on in the future. The residential side of the site is on a slight ridge that runs along the street; behind those houses is another new house and the park. In the near distance, gracefully overlooking Rosedale, is the cathedral. All in all, it's one of the most glorious settings in Washington.
The design focus of the subdivision plan relied heavily on architecture that took its cues from the neighborhood. Cleveland Park, the area encompassing Rosedale, is where President Grover Cleveland built his summer residence in 1886. It's an eclectic mix of architectural styles—Victorian, Queen Anne, Craftsman, Shingle Style, and stuccos are all represented—and home to some of Washington's most powerful lawyers, journalists, and authors. Five of the new houses sit on a busy residential street, while the sixth new house and the renovated farmhouse occupy interior lots.
“We wanted to create a microcosm of Cleveland Park that allowed for both diversity and scale,” says Dale Overmyer, who served as the site architect for the project and designed the new home on the interior lot. “All the [project] architects tried to use elements that could be found in the immediate neighborhood.”
The 6,156-square-foot house designed by Washington architect Michael Marshall, for example, is a Renaissance Revival style that echoes many of the stucco homes in the neighborhood. Inside the three-bedroom, four-and-a-half-bath home are the kinds of touches that present challenges to a builder—intersecting-coin vaulted ceilings, extensive crown molding—but that are a requirement for the sophisticated homeowners who live here.
Tucked between the park and the homes that overlook the street is another jewel, the sixth, interior-lot house. An 8,947-square-foot, cottage-style shingled home with gambrel-shaped roofs, it fairly screams “summer compound.” Overmyer's design also has killer views of the cathedral, plus an expanse of lawn that extends from the house into the park, with only a few bushes separating the two parcels. The space feels like it's a million miles from urban life when, in fact, it's just four miles from the White House.
“Rosedale is very special,” says Dunn, who lives in a shingled house of his own design on the residential-street row. “Those who bought lots here really went into this on faith, because we didn't have a subdivision approved and we didn't have approval to tear down the dorms. Basically, we didn't have anything. But there was faith that it would be a really amazing place to live.
“In the end, everybody was happy. The neighborhood got to keep its three-acre park, the historic people got the offending dorms torn down, and the oldest house in Washington was preserved and restored.”
And six new houses went up in a neighborhood that rarely sees that kind of activity. For once, the developer and the builder got to play the role of good guys.
Kathleen Stanley is a freelance writer based in Washington.
Project: Rosedale, Washington; Site size: 3.1 acres (homes), 3.1 acres (park); Total units: 7 (6 new construction, 1 existing home); Price: home and lot prices withheld, $12.1 million for the land; Builder: Gibson Builders, Washington; Developers: Jim Gibson, Sam Dunn, and Bob Holman, Washington; Architects: Sam Dunn, Overmyer Architects, SMB Architects, Michael Marshall Architecture, and Richard Williams Architects, all in Washington; Site architect: Overmyer Architects; Civil engineer: CAS Engineering, Mount Airy, Md.