A huge renovation made this the most expensive home in Cambridge
If you walked into 47 Raymond St. in Cambridge just over 10 years ago, you’d have found a family home right out of the 1930s or 1940s — and not in a quirky, vintage way.
“It didn’t have a lot of character,” Doug Hanna, a partner at S+H Construction who would eventually gut and renovate the home, told Boston.com. He remembered its closed concept nature, the unlivable basement, and outdated vibe.
47 Raymond St. was built in 1893 in a fairly typical late 19th-century style. The current owners, who are originally from Iceland, bought the home in 1998 for $875,000.
Now, after a major gut renovation in 2006, they are selling the five-bedroom, 7,258-square-foot home steps from Harvard Square — this time, for $11.5 million, a 1,300 percent increase in price.
That makes it the most expensive current listing in Cambridge by several million dollars. If it sells for $11.5 million it appears it would become the most expensive single-family home purchase in the city’s history, according to a search of property records.
Hanna said that about 15 years ago, the owners had him do an exterior rehab, when he and his team put on a new roof, siding, trim, gutters, and other details. It wasn’t a drastic change.
“When you look at it from the outside, it doesn’t look typical New England anymore because we did put different details, but it still looks like a regular house you would see around here,” Hanna said.
Once you walk inside, well, that’s a different story.
See inside 47 Raymond St. in Cambridge:
The owners hired Reykjavík, Iceland architect Björn Skaptason of Atelier Architecture to design their home and Hanna as the local builder to do the work. Hanna said that the owners even flew him to Iceland to see their apartment there so he could get a feel for the vibe they were going for.
“We changed this house into a open floor plan on the main floor,” Skaptason said via email. “Before it was with many corridors and many doors into smaller spaces. The house was also opened up towards the backyard so the inside and outside play together, and wasn’t like that before.”
The home now has a 4,000-bottle wine cellar, a heated driveway that melts snow, smart-house tech that controls everything, a room that is used as an art gallery, distressed-looking walnut floors, electronic shades that disappear when drawn up, and a gas fireplace in the wall of the kitchen.
Though the technology and amenities put the home into the luxury category, it is the aesthetic that is most unique.
Skaptason said that although the home has a connection to Iceland — the white and black color scheme reference ice and the country’s landscape — the design mainly reflects his style as an architect.
“There’s no trim anywhere,” Hanna said. “No baseboards, no casings, except on some windows. Most of the doors are pocket doors and some are fancy, like glass pocket doors.”
The large living room is separated from the dining room with a pocket door. The staircases even have glass handrails, one of which acts as a partition on the first floor. When Hanna and his team were working, they found old blueprints of the house from the 1930s when a previous renovation was done, which the owners decided to have etched into the glass.
The lighting is almost all recessed and Hanna estimates there are close to 400 lights throughout the home. The kitchen is filled with granite and stainless steel appliances.
The details are almost endless. Even the backyard has a beautiful fountain.
Skaptason said that when people walk into the home, he wants then to feel “that it’s timeless in terms of circulation, flow and use of forms and materials. One is supposed to feel freedom in the open floor plan and connect to the outside.”
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