Built in 1853, on the site of a stable in a vernacular Greek Revival style, 130 Charles Street was always a modest house in the heart of the bustling dockside of Greenwich Village. The house’s broad four-bay front belies its shallow depth and rhomboid shape in plan. For most of its history the house was a multi-occupancy building used either as a rooming house or as tiny studio apartments. In the 1980s it was converted into a single-family home. The condition of the house was pretty dire when the architects started design work: shabby on the outside, with a warren of small rooms with sloping floors inside.

Design concept and solution: The renovation of the front façade was governed by its Landmark District status. Plastic-framed windows, security grills, and painted metal caps on brownstone sills and lintels were all removed. Brickwork, brownstone, and railings were restored and replaced. Inside, the 2,800-square-foot house was gutted. The basement was excavated two feet and the house underpinned. A steel structure was introduced at the core of the house, allowing the architects to create large, four-bay rooms on the first three floors. The chimney breast and fireplaces on the east side were removed, and those on the western wall were renovated.