For $759,900, a comfort area on Caroline Street

“The new house of Mr. Stuart Ellis on lower Main [now Caroline] Street has been finished through Mr. Ellis and family and Mr. And Mrs. W.E. Long. It is a handsome modern-day home.”

—The Daily Star (predecessor to The Free Lance-Star)

That became the tale of 111 Caroline St. Almost a hundred years ago, and nowadays, some owners and duration of some dilapidation later, it’s far over again a handsome and current domestic because it prepares to go into its 2nd century.

When they offered the place in 2001, Janice and Lawrence Toperoff knew they had been assigned a rescue challenge. “People questioned if we knew what we had been getting ourselves into,” Janice Toperoff stated during the latest tour of the belongings.

The essential preservation and expansion that became finished in 2003 furnished them with a satisfying region to live beyond sixteen years. But now, with an eye fixed towards downsizing and fewer steps to climb, the Toperoffs have decided to skip 111 Caroline directly to its next steward. They’ve listed it with Janel O’Malley of Coldwell Banker Carriage House Realty in Fredericksburg. The asking price is $759,900.

The home’s lower Caroline Street region gives it a pleasant view of the Rappahannock River, particularly when the leaves are off the bushes. The huge, flat flood simple is all that stands between the residence and the river.

With its two-story front porch and renewed cedar shake siding, the house is genuinely particular and from the street appears plenty because it did whilst new. The original proprietors, the Ellises and the Longs had torn down a preceding residence that occupied the lot so one can build a brand new duplex for their families, in line with facts compiled by way of Nichol Forbes for a Historic Fredericksburg Foundation Inc. Marker document. The domestic has facet-by-aspect front doors, considered one of that is now shuttered over.

Janice Toperoff stated the house turned into still being used as a duplex when the couple offered it. They lived upstairs at the same time as the primary degree was transformed. Later, they rented the upstairs area to personal tenants for a time, and destiny owners ought to choose to do the equal, or no longer.

Altogether, the residence is indexed with three bedrooms, three full bathrooms, and half a tub. The total living area is about three,200 rectangular ft with another 1,000 unfinished square feet in the basement. It sits on a decent-sized city lot of about an 8th of an acre.

The protection becomes near a complete gut, presenting all-new electric-powered plumbing and a new 3-sector HVAC machine. Wherever the authentic, hard-skimmed plaster-on-lathe walls might be saved, they were. Original coronary heart pine floors become also retained wherein feasible. A widespread unmarried-tale addition with a basement becomes constructed onto the rear of the house. Pocket doors had been introduced here and there to the shop area. A device inside the basement controls the Whole-residence sound.

With direct access to the primary stage closed off, the front door opens to a lobby with stairs to the higher stage directly ahead and French doorways to the right’s primary degree residing region.

One step into the primary dwelling place, and it’s obtrusive that plenty of work has been accomplished to create a brilliant and welcoming space. The dwelling-room, or parlor, has its original white-painted brick hearth set up for fuel logs. Low shelving with windows above flank the hearth, and recessed ceiling lights have been added.

Nearby is a powder room, which extends right into an area that holds the laundry machines.

The residing room flows into the own family room, which’s superbly appointed and offers a wall of windows for masses of herbal light.

The open ground plan maintains into the eating room, which, like other rooms, indicates the nicely-preserved authentic wide, flat door and window trim ordinary of the period. The identical appearance is rekindled nowadays in modern-day Craftsman-fashion creation.

Toperoff said the flat trim style and “cottage Craftsman creation” become replicated inside the addition area “as a nod to what changed into here at the beginning.”

From the dining room, one leaves the original portion of the residence and steps into the addition, which on the main degree holds the master suite.

Toperoff explained that the rear addition changed a two-tale napping porch on the rear of the house, so the residence’s real footprint did no longer an alternative. The kitchen becomes constructed as a new 2d stage atop current one-vehicle storage, which is transformed into the residing area.

The kitchen, which has rear balcony access, is handsomely appointed with white cabinetry, Corian counters, hardwood floors, and stainless steel home equipment—except for a white refrigerator. A movable butcher-block island serves double duty as a breakfast desk.

The big main bedroom has both a bay window and a french door to entry to the Trex balcony that overlooks the backyard lawn. The grasp restroom has a dual conceitedness, a reglazed claw-foot bath that may be original to the house, and a separate, glass-enclosed bath. Also within the lavatory is a door to the big stroll-in closet.

Completely freshened and revamped, the upper degree retains its function as a self-sufficient dwelling location, though it can without problems be configured as the second tale of a single-own family domestic. It has a living room, dining room, kitchen, and bedrooms that proportion to a full bathroom.

The basement portion under the addition is installation as a family room (with a pull-out sofa for a single day guest). There are a complete toilet and moist bar area. The adjoining former storage is now completed off as a domestic workplace. The basement area beneath the house’s unique portion changed into left unfinished but is well-used and consists of a workshop, interest room, and storage area.

The basement opens to a paved rear patio with a hanging porch swing and views of the river throughout the flood undeniable. Tranquility is observed here, in conjunction with a raised garden encircled via stacked flagstones. A kind of flora, shrubs, and small timber is represented, consisting of Japanese holly, clematis, hosta, juniper, Japanese maple, and crape myrtle. On the edges is privacy fencing.