Andre George and Janet Liles in their Boerum Hill home.
Five 50-plus New Yorkers who carved out of a gritty city dwelling quarters suited to their particular needs
By Judith Stiles
There was an old woman who lived in a shoe … And there are over a million and a half older men and women living in New York City, not all in shoebox apartments but in dwellings that range from sunny one-bedrooms to grand ante-bellum mansions – even boats. Here are five New Yorkers who managed to carve out personal dream homes suited to their unique needs, so that the shoe finally fits.
Ceramics professor Janice Farley
In the late 1970s, Janice Farley packed up her Vermont pottery business and moved her giant gas kiln to a bare-bones loft in Tribeca, back when the area was a wasteland of abandoned and burned-out buildings. Just in case the building inspectors showed up unexpectedly, she hid her 10-cubic-foot brick kiln under a sheet with books piled on top. The inspectors never came, and her life as a ceramics artist flourished along with the “new” Tribeca. The ’80s brought two babies, Josiah and Emma, an advent that relegated the pottery studio to the dark and virtually windowless basement. Then in the late ’90s, as chairman of the art department at Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn, Ms. Farley longed to live closer to her office. So just as she had pioneered the hinterland of Tribeca two decades earlier, she decided to move to the non-trendy Bay Ridge section of Brooklyn.
She bought a three-story townhouse with a garden yard and windowless basement. But with Josiah off at college and Emma a senior in high school, she made the bold decision to place her pottery studio in the best part of the house. On the ground floor behind original French doors she built a studio that opens up to that backyard garden with fresh air and sunlight. Now she can stir soup in the kitchen before breezing through her French doors to throw some pots. It’s artist’s dream come true – smack in the middle of Brooklyn.
Swimming coach Leon Katz
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Leon Katz coaching swimming at the Sol Goldman Y on 14th Street. |
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If Leon Katz could have lived in the pool, or at least on the pool floor at the Sol Goldman Y on 14th Street, he probably would have, because that’s where he spent a significant portion of his 85 years, coaching swimming. Instead, Mr. Katz built a nest for himself, his wife, and their four children in Seward Park Cooperative Village on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, where he has now lived comfortably for more than 40 years. The Seward co-ops on Grand Street were originally built as Mitchell-Llama housing for middle-income New Yorkers. In 1969, renters were given the opportunity to buy their apartments, which Leon and his wife Dorothea readily did. They raised their four kids in that sunny three-bedroom apartment, and the whole family frequented city pools to boost the “Learn to Swim Program” that Leon had founded in the 1960s.
The family was almost always too busy to participate in community canasta games and other such activities, but that didn’t stop them from enjoying the company of fellow tenants. Eldest daughter Dr. Jane Katz (author of the swimming “bible” Fitness for Life) never strayed far from her beloved Lower East Side; she lives within walking distance of the old family pad. Younger daughter Elaine now lives on the same floor as Dad at Seward, which it makes it easy for her to look in on him.
They all lament some of the trendy neighborhood changes, but they still have their favorite shops: Kossar’s bagel and biali store and Katz’s deli where, as Dr. Katz puts it, “the waiters are still sharp but surly and, since they know Leon’s family, they are likely to sneak an extra slice of pastrami in our sandwich order. Yes, it’s still the old neighborhood.”
House rescuers Andre George and Janet Liles
When the owner of a beautiful ante-bellum mansion on State Street in Boerum Hill fell on hard times, he could no longer keep the water and electricity going for the residents, himself, and 47 cats. He died without a family or heirs, leaving behind a run-down 4,000-square-foot structure that was the height of elegance when it was built in the 1850s. By 1999 the city had seized the property and sold it at auction. One man’s misfortune became luck for Andre George and wife Janet Liles, who purchased the property at a below market price with the hope of restoring its original splendor.
Andre, a structural engineer, plunged into the project by first restoring the entire foundation. Janet, an interior designer, used decades of experience redecorating other people’s homes to finally create her own dream house. She attentively restored the original molding and details while adding modern Cubist block tiles, similar to Parisian subway tiles, because she loves to combine the old with the new. She had four white-marble fireplaces lovingly brought back to their original beauty at a cost of nearly $16,000, and she chose to keep the signature coffin niche on the grand central staircase. In the kitchen there was installed an ecology-conscious counter-top made of “ice stone,” – recycled beer-bottle glass ground up into a stone-like material, with a subtle but zesty sparkle. Every inch of molding and detail that could be saved was restored, which landed the house on the registry of historic homes.
Sailing aficionado Claire Mahon
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Claire Mahon on her sailboat home in Liberty State Park
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Gone are the days of Captain Ahab’s damp and frigid living quarters. Say hello to the warm and cozy cabin of 63-year-old sailor Claire Mahon, who bid farewell to her landlubber days when she decided to make a home aboard her 39-foot sailboat, “Gypsy Soul.” The slip where she parks her boat year round is in New York harbor among roughly 500 other vessels, most of them uninhabited during the dead of winter. Ms. Mahon loves to cook, which is why her galley has an oven, stovetop burners, a microwave, and a fridge. Gypsy Soul has two heads (toilets), one shower, and a computer, which Mahon is not sure she can live without.
These days she works part-time as a consultant for non-profit organizations, which makes it necessary for her to don business attire for meetings on land. She leaves in the morning with a briefcase, wearing a suit and sneakers, carefully stepping off the boat onto the dock. Not until she reaches her office or appointment does she select an appropriate pair of high heels from the trunk of her car.
Ms. Mahon enjoys her neighbors, and has learned a great deal from them about sailing. “I think sailing has always been in me,” she says cheerfully, adding: “My only regret is that I didn’t do this twenty years earlier.”
Lifetime New Yorker Barbara Smith
Barbara Smith, is completely at ease getting around the Selis Manor apartment building, a friendly housing complex for the blind or visually impaired where she lives with her 13-year-old daughter Jessica. Blind since birth, Ms. Smith has a lovely smile that makes her appear much younger than her 54 years. She is too busy to participate in many of the activities provided by Visions, a community service center that is just an elevator ride downstairs in her building on West 23rd Street. Visions offers classes in adapted computer programs, rehabilitation training, bowling, support groups, even fitness classes – all for free. Ms. Smith prefers to get her exercise walking to the grocery store and in programs she participates in at St. Vincent’s Hospital. She is pleased that Jessica is within walking distance of the School of the Future, where Ms. Smith sometimes attends her daughter’s basketball games, listening to the play-by play narrated by another parent.
Everybody in Selis Manor knows Barbara, and she admits with a wry smile that, as at other close-knit apartment buildings, there can be a fair amount of local gossip, which she avoids. Both mother and daughter are comfortable in their cozy one-bedroom apartment, especially now that Brad, the Labrador seeing-eye dog, has retired to live elsewhere after 13 years. “The thing I like most about Selis Manor is that it is convenient to everything I need,” says Ms. Smith as her daughter hands her a bag of food to cook for dinner. “When Jesse is off to college, this is where you’ll find me.”
