NO SUN… no matter. My friend Elke Kuhn has wrought a lush green miracle on the north-facing terrace behind her 2nd floor Brooklyn apartment.
Go here to read today’s Brownstoner post about how she manages to nurture all sorts of lovely things and keep them going from year to year.
ONE OF THE GREAT THINGS ABOUT BLOGGING is making new friends. Lula and I met only a few months ago, when she stumbled upon my blog and contacted me. We soon discovered we are neighbors in two places. She has an adorable cottage a few blocks from mine in Springs (East Hampton), N.Y., as well as a parlor floor she’s owned for 16 years in a classic 1850s Italianate brownstone in Brooklyn, top and below, virtually around the corner from where I lived for two decades (though we had never run into each other).
She lives in a state of Bohemian splendor, presently suspended in mid-renovation. Having peeled off old wallpaper, the walls have a Venetian plaster look but await further plaster and paint. The ceiling has been stabilized in parts where it was falling down. There are nearly intact plaster cornice moldings all the way around, with what Lula calls her ‘Shakespearen troupe’ of faces. A new kitchen is in the cards, and there’s a potential terrace at the back which is just tar paper, no railings, at the moment.
Most of the elaborate plaster cornice is in great shape, above. Other parts, below, not so much.
Lula is grappling with the questions endemic to living on the parlor floor of a brownstone.
All that remains to be seen. Meanwhile, the place has great cozy charm. With all that original detail, antiques acquired piecemeal over the years, an overstuffed sofa, plants on the window sills, and faded Oriental rugs, it feels much like being back in the Victorian era, for real.
After my first-ever visit to Lula’s apartment, we went and checked out the new Fork & Pencil warehouse on Bergen Street, above, a few-months-old, crammed-full, well-vetted consignment store — a spin-off of the smaller storefront on Court Street — whose proceeds go to non-profit conservation, arts, and other organizations. It’s more Lula’s kind of place than mine, filled with traditional antiques, but more to the point, I don’t need anything at the moment. Browsing there is purely a theoretical exercise for me. I admire, appreciate, and move on. Don’t need anything, thanks!
We had a civilized late lunch nearby at Broken English, the sort of self-conscious industrial chic space one used to expect only in Manhattan. I’m glad it’s come to Brooklyn, because my rigatoni with marinara and basil was scrumptious, and the salad, bread, and olive oil were tops. You can tell the quality of a restaurant by its bread and salad, I once read, and I think that’s on the mark. Broken English is open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Ignore the snarky online reviews from amateur critics and give it a try. It’s a welcome addition to the nabe, in my book.
I’ve seen about a dozen apartments in the past week, and none of them made my heart sing.
There have been a couple — two in the same building on Henry Street in Cobble Hill, a parlor floor and the one above, both available immediately at $2,500 — that made my heart hum a little tune, however.
The one downstairs (parlor floor)
The one upstairs (third floor)
The lyrics go like this:
Where oh where will I put my queen size bed
And what about my 8-foot-long bookcase
But look at those nice long windows
And how lovely it would be to have coffee on the terrace out back
The one upstairs has more space
But the one downstairs has a load of charm
The one upstairs has a better layout
But the one downstairs has moldings and a mantel
The one upstairs has more light
But the one downstairs has that terrace
Both of them cost more than I intended to spend
But the neighborhood is safe and convenient
Oh the other hand, it’s so bo-ring
I lived there 25 years ago
Do I want to run into people from the old days
Or do I want new adventures (and restaurants) a couple of neighborhoods over?
Basically, I enjoy the apartment hunt. It gets me in to see a lot of old houses (and, more often than not, mourn what’s been done to them).
It reminds me of the time my sister and I went to Just Shades on Prince Street looking for lampshades for a pair of fabulous figural bases she’d scored at an auction. I could have stayed there all day, trying different shapes and sizes. When we’d found the best option, I was disappointed. I wanted to keep going, because I was having so much fun.
Finding a place to live — whether a house or an apartment, to buy or to rent, is always a game — of comparison and compromise. With 500 new Craigslist postings for Brooklyn apartments this morning alone, I think I’ll keep playing.
THIS SPRING, IF YOU SPOT A WOMAN in a flower-covered hat pushing a red shopping cart full of plants around downtown Brooklyn, it’s probably my friend Elke.
A true gardener like Elke, whose outdoor space is a 15’x25′ terrace behind her second-floor apartment in Brooklyn Heights, doesn’t let a few obstacles stop her.
No car? No worries. She does her plant-shopping on foot at the Borough Hall Greenmarket and local stores like GRDN on Hoyt Street, takes the bus to Gowanus Nursery in Red Hook, and relies on Bruno’s Housewares on Court Street to deliver clay pots (never plastic), soil, and other heavy supplies. (The cast iron urns came from Restoration Hardware.)
No direct sun? Elke makes the most of every ray that penetrates the ailanthus canopy around her north-facing terrace: a single hour in the morning and a couple more at midday. By choosing the right plants and coddling them — even shifting them around from time to time to give each a piece of the limited sun — she has wrought a lush green miracle, don’t you agree? (These pictures were taken last June.)
Among Elke’s shade-lovers: vines and climbers like moonflower and morning glory on tuteurs, rosemary topiaries (in the sunniest corner), jasmine, hibiscus, ferns, caladiums, an amazing purple and white ‘corkscrew’ plant (below), coleus, hostas, spotted begonias, passionflower. “I don’t do impatiens,” she says.
Here are Elke’s tips for terrace-garden design and healthy container plants, even if you don’t have a ton of sun:
What makes Elke’s terrace garden so out-of-the-ordinary? I think it has something to do with exotic foliage and unusual color combinations. A multi-disciplinary artist/designer, her favorites are gray/silver (e.g. dusty miller) with chartreuse and burgundy (e.g. sweet potato vine) — and splashes of pink from “as many flowers as I can get.”
casaCARA 