Vintage Cottage in Springs 450K

THIS IS A PROPERTY I KNOW very well. It’s near where I live, for one thing, and I pass it almost daily. For another, I looked at it myself a year-and-a-half ago before buying a roughly similar place just down the road (this house has been mostly off the market since then).

I actually like the house a lot, and I like its potential even more. Can’t guess its age — 1920s perhaps? — but it had a big old barn, which has since been removed. The architecture is plain and unpretentious, with the cedar shingles characteristic of old East End houses. The kitchen is huge and has a country feeling. It’s got 2BR, as does mine, two baths (I have one), and a garage (I have none). It’s 1,000 square feet to my 800, and on a similar size lot, a ‘shy’ half-acre.

So why did I buy mine and not this one? First and key, mine cost 130K less than they’re asking for this house — but my house and property were in far worse condition. My lot is heavily wooded and has a more secluded feel. This one is more exposed, but nothing landscaping couldn’t fix. It cries out for a fence and hedge to shield it from the (fairly busy but not as bad as I feared at first) road.

The other thing that made me prefer my house is the fact that my main living space has a high peaked ceiling and skylights. The living and dining room here, below, feel a bit claustrophobic because the ceilings are low. Rip ‘em out, I say (there’s nothing but empty attic space above), and you’ve got a soaring, expansive interior.

Furthermore, it’s in Springs, which I can now confirm as a full-time resident, is GREAT. We’ve got the best bay beaches and a cute historic district with a general store, library, art galleries, and the Jackson Pollock-Lee Krasner Study Center. This house is a short walk from the historic district, as well as from two other vital amenities: a wine store and pizza place — and, of course, it’s five miles from East Hampton and Amagansett, if you’re looking for chic restaurants and/or ocean beaches.

The asking price is more than fair for all that. Now take it away. For more info, go here. Or contact Karen Benvenuto, Saunders Real Estate, 631/458-4933, kbenvenuto@saundersre.com

Perennial Bargains

NOW IS THE TIME to make like a vulture and swoop down on sale perennials. From mid-August on, local nurseries have them for 30-50% off. A smidgen of gardening knowledge goes a long way here; you need confidence to buy things that are long past flowering and may be looking a little tattered.

That’s normal. You’ll be cutting them back anyway, almost to the ground, before winter. Next spring, with their roots well-established, they’ll be raring to go again.

<- Digitalis purpurea ‘Candy Mountain’

Yesterday I popped into Wittendale’s in East Hampton and bought three foxgloves, left (biennials, which put out attractive rosettes of leaves the first year and spectacular flowers the second — next summer, that is). I also got a variegated lirope, below, with yellow-green leaves, to fill in a bare spot in my front garden, and three long-blooming (still blooming, in fact) bleeding hearts, bottom, which I know will do well, as they tolerate both shade and deer. All are big and healthy- looking and attractive as-is. Total: about $35. Would have bought more, but that was all they had of what I could use.

Lirope muscari ‘Silvery Sunproof’

In the next few days, I’ll check out other area nurseries. Perennials need to go into the ground at least six weeks before the first frost of the season, which could be as late as November 10 here on eastern Long Island, so there’s plenty of time as far as the plants are concerned. But I want first pick of the sale items — they’ll go fast, and only get more bedraggled as time goes on.

Dicentra formosa ‘Luxuriant’

Deck Day

ALL HANDS ARE NOT YET ON DECK, but at least the wood was delivered yesterday for my backyard deck and shower platform. The builder will be here tomorrow to begin, and within 3 days, weather permitting, I’ll have a much improved situation behind my house.

Above, the “before” in the area of the outdoor shower, where there will be a 6′x9′ raised platform, three steps up, with a bench and enclosure (it will be nice to have some privacy;-) The small bathroom window will be replaced with a glass door, which is on order.

Below, the “before” of the backyard itself, where my temporary covering of wood chips will be replaced with a separate 16′x24′ cedar platform one step up from the ground.

I’ve moved a big old stand of chelone (turtlehead), below, as well as some ferns that will be affected by the new deck, to another spot in the yard. That was a three-afternoon undertaking (afternoons because I spent most of each day working myself up to the task, before finally heading out there around 3 o’clock).

Didn’t want to lose these shade-loving, deer-resistant fall bloomers: chelone lyoni (pink turtlehead).

Late in the day, a local landscaper — one of several I’d put out feelers to — came with a worker to dig up an 18′ tall threadleaf false cypress, below, in a corner of the screened porch, which would have had to be cut down if I couldn’t find someone to give it away to. I guess it must be worth something, because one of them agreed to take it. Brutal job, and it’s not done yet. The root ball is enormous and has to be fully dug up today and carted away.

This is the first major building project I’ve done here. Can’t count the new roof; that wasn’t any fun. A new roof hardly improved my quality of life, especially since the old one wasn’t even leaking (though I was assured it would if I didn’t replace it right away).

The deck, however, and the outdoor shower…Now those say ‘beach house.’ Yeah.

Midsummer Update, Random Pix

Dusty road, Amagansett

I’VE BEEN A LITTLE LAX in the blog department lately. Maybe you’ve noticed? Blame it on the heat in this depressing summer of the oil spill, that last month was an unprecedented catastrophe and now is not so bad after all, to hear the authorities spin it. Feel better? I would, a little, if anyone could be believed.

Life is good here in Springs, the “Brooklyn of East Hampton,” as my friend Jill calls it. By that I think she means a few miles from the epicenter, lots of artists, and long stretches of beach (though ours lacks a parachute jump). I just found out that Lou Reed and Laurie Anderson bought a house last summer on Old Stone Highway. That clinches Springs for hipness.

Outside the Old Stone Market: even our delis are arty here in Springs

My garden is nothing to crow about — it looks much the same as it did in June. I haven’t planted anything new. I’m waiting for end-of-summer sales to fill in the bare spots.

“End of summer.” Saddest words in the English language? Not because I love summer more than other seasons, especially this brutal one (I finally broke down and bought an air conditioner). But the passing of any season makes me melancholy. One less summer, fall, winter, spring… life draws in.

Awesome Rose of Sharon hedge

Well, we’re not quite there yet. Let’s call it height of summer. Anyhow, by way of excuses, and for the sake of continuity, here’s what I’ve been up to:

• Watering, watering, watering, and praying for rain that never seems to come. From watering cans, I went to a hand-held hose, and now I see the wisdom of sprinklers. The process takes 1-1/2 hours any way you slice it, at least every other day. (Soaker hoses are too advanced for me.)
• Dealing with damage from a freak wind/rainstorm — some call it a tornado — about three weeks ago. The storm lasted all of 15 minutes, and left hundreds of broken trees in its wake. The roadsides are still full of debris the Town hasn’t yet picked up. A big oak in my front yard, below, broke in half; I called Eric, the Tree Man of Montauk, to take it down and cart it away. My front area is getting sunnier — not a bad thing.

• Enjoying my house guests. What would summer in the Hamptons be without them? I’m delighted so many friends and relatives want to visit. They’re getting me to the beach more than I would go otherwise. Swimming in Gardiner’s Bay on an almost-daily basis is a joy.

$25 rummage sale find: Victorian wicker dresser for the guest room (formerly owned by Mel Brooks and Anne Bancroft)

• Eating (lobster, steamers, mussels — don’t tell the rabbi), drinking, spending. Favorite home-made summer beverage: sangria, a great way to enjoy cheap wine. My favorite new restaurant: The Boathouse, overlooking Three Mile Harbor, with it’s $27 prix fixe before 6:30PM.

Dinner party in Southampton

• Speaking of early bird specials, I’ve been letting my hair go “natural” for a year, and now it’s  done. No more low-lights, maintenance, choosing between Golden Ash Brown and Medium Warm Brown. It’s just whatever comes out of my scalp, and there’s a lot of…silver. I may look older, but I feel chic. (No illustration for this one. I have yet to see a photo of myself with my new look, and I’m not sure I want to.)

Rocks I covet

• A bit of writing — three articles for Hamptons Cottages & Gardens, only one of which has yet appeared — and a new assignment for Garden Design.

• Keeping my tenants happy. This apartment needs a new air conditioner, that one an exterminator for moths, here the stove ignition isn’t firing, and so it goes. All in a day’s work.

• Making plans to visit my daughter in Maui in November. It’ll be the beginning of whale season. I asked if you have to go out in a boat to see them, and she said: “No, you can probably see them from my window.” Sounds more exciting than deer from my window.

• Cruising Craigslist for a Brooklyn pied-a-terre come winter. Yes, I know I said that last year, ended up loving winter here in East Hampton and didn’t want to budge. But I am bothered that, for the first time in 32 years, we have no family base in Brooklyn. And saddened that what I still think of as the stuff of my “real life” — furniture, art, rugs, books, family pictures — is sitting in a warehouse. Will I ever see it again? Not unless I get a place to put it. I may not need an apartment in New York, but my furniture does. Something like this, perhaps? —>

• Anticipating my new deck here in Springs, set to happen next week. I had measured and staked something out for bid purposes. Then my friend Jifat, an architect, paid me a visit and said, “Oh, no no no no no.” She helped me re-measure and re-stake, and now the scheme and proportions are much improved. Jifat conceived two decks. One will be a 6′x9′ shower platform three steps up, with an enclosure to be made of half-moon gates, below, left over from a previous project. As the outdoor shower is right outside the bathroom, I’m going to have the bathroom window replaced with a glass door. The main deck will be 16′x24′ off the back porch, with one wide step all the way around. I got four estimates, and chose the contractor Jifat recommended. Looking forward to the chaos and excitement of construction.

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Fire Island Forever

Just to clarify, in response to a confused e-mail: I refer to several different Fire Island communities in the post below, but all photos were taken this week in Ocean Beach.

IN THE ANNALS of my personal real estate regrets, Fire Island is a biggie. Coulda shoulda woulda.

For non-New Yorkers, Fire Island is a 40-mile-long, quarter-mile-wide sandbar off the south shore of Long Island, reachable only by ferry and banned to cars; the only wheeled vehicles are bicycles, golf carts, and little red wagons.

We rented the Ocean Beach charmer, above, for a month in 1985.

In the early 1980s, my parents rented a 1920s cottage on a huge lot in Lonelyville, reached via a long wooden boardwalk through stands of tall grass, invisible to all comers until the last instant. It could have been had for $100,000. They didn’t buy it, nor did we. I was worried about mosquitoes, and money.

In 1998, having rented in Fire Island many more summers, we bid in earnest on a property in Fair Harbor, very near the ocean — one of those quirky places you know by now I like. It was known as ‘Half House,’ because half of it (the bottom half) had been washed away in the great hurricane  of 1938. So the original 2nd floor sat atop a wood deck — just a cedar-shingled triangle, with a separate guest shack, on two lots, a rarity. We negotiated all winter to get the price down to $245,000, then backed out at the last minute. I was worried about beach erosion, flood insurance, and money.

Somebody slap me upside the head, willya?

Of course, now there’s not a thing under half a mil anywhere on Fire Island, and in that price range it’s going to be the size of a trailer.

Earlier this week, I spent two days in Ocean Beach, visiting a friend who reminded me I passed on the house next door for 180K, now on the market for 850K.

Ocean Beach is the metropolis of Fire Island, the only community with an actual main drag, below, of stores and restaurants. It’s also the only year-round community, with water and an elementary school, but that is not a lifestyle for the faint-hearted (or sociable). The Ocean Beach ferry runs all year long, weather permitting, though in January and February it’s more like an ice-breaker.

I walked around Ocean Beach taking pictures, noting how few and far between the remaining old houses are. Most have been torn down and replaced, or expanded beyond recognition, but it’s those funky vintage cottages that are dearest to my heart.

Of course I looked in the windows of real estate offices. There’s a geodesic dome (!) for 595K in nearby Corneille Estates, and a number of other properties in the 5′s and 6′s, which is probably a comedown from years past.

I’m in no position to take advantage at the moment, but the beach is nice and wide, and I didn’t get a single mosquito bite.