Otterbein house 'is us'

The Baltimore Sun

When Don and Michaeline Fedder bought a house in Otterbein 22 years ago, both moved in empty-handed.

"We came out of separate homes and past lives with nothing," Michaeline Fedder recalled. "Now 99 percent of what we have we bought together."

The remaining 1 percent consists of family portraits and photographs that grace several walls and tables of their South Baltimore home.

Along a cobblestone alley just east of Camden Yards, the Fedders' four-level townhouse is one of three built in 1984 that sit opposite restored dwellings from the late 19th century. The juxtaposition of style is an interesting one, the common denominator being red-brick construction.

The newly married couple paid $135,000 for the 1,700-square-foot home that included a carport in the rear off a narrow side street. Both were enamored of the location and its easy access to the shops, restaurants and entertainment of Federal Hill.

"I'm a New Yorker," said Michaeline Fedder, a 70-year-old lobbyist for the American Heart Association. "I always wanted to live in the city."

And while the living was easy, they felt the design of the main level, which is steps up from the front door, inhibited the flow and chopped up the 22-foot-wide by 35-foot-deep house.

"This house had a partition right about here," said Don Fedder, indicating with a broad gesture a wall that used to separate the kitchen at the front of the house from the living and dining room.

The couple hired local designer and contractor Arthur Valk to open up the space.

A tray ceiling in the redesigned kitchen, glass shelving over a window there, and a curved, lowered ceiling at the kitchen's entrance present a sweeping effect that appears to "stretch" the entire level widthwise and lengthwise.

Birch cabinets, black appliances, black-and-white tiled backsplashes and light ceramic tiling offer an airy feel.

Don Fedder, 80, a professor of pharmacy at the University of Maryland, Baltimore, estimated that they spent upward of $60,000 on the kitchen project, custom low-rise laminate cabinets along the entire west wall of the living level, and select furniture pieces.

"We never go out consciously to buy anything," Michaeline Fedder said, in reference to their hundreds of pieces of art. "And if we see something, we both have to love it."

A sectional sofa covered in a beige faux suede microfiber sprawls in J-shaped fashion along the living room's east wall. Above the sofa, framed pieces include nudes in black-and-white photography, watercolor street scenes, Taiwanese tapestries and hanging sculpture.

Whimsical pieces collected by the couple include an iron occasional table, the top of which is a New York City manhole cover, and a hanging tapestry of a cow. Purchased in Switzerland, the cartoon-like bovine sports a blue head, big yellow eyes with black lashes and a body of red, brown and orange swirls.

By contrast, a gallery wall from the second to third level displays family portraits that include great-grandparents, family reunion photos, favorite aunts, mothers and fathers. A library table at the third-floor landing has nearly a hundred more family pictures in frames of all sizes and shapes, some jeweled, some enameled, all showing off the couple's two children each by former marriages, grandchildren and myriad nieces and nephews.

The third floor features a sitting room and the master bedroom furnished with a birch bedroom suite, including a four-poster, queen bed topped with billowing green quilting.

The open fourth level is painted a bright celadon. Artwork on this floor includes a framed village tapestry from Guatemala and a heron tapestry from Egypt.

The Fedders' contentment is obvious in a house they say "is us."

"We might get old," Michaeline Fedder teases, "and we'll have trouble climbing the steps. But for now, we're OK and it's great exercise."

Have you found your dream home? Tell us about it. Write to Dream Home, Real Estate Editor, The Sun, 501 N. Calvert St., Baltimore 21278, or e-mail us at real.estate@baltsun.com. For more dream homes and photos, go to http:--www.baltimoresun.com/business/realestate, click on Dream Home.

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