Home of the Week

This house made its move. Your turn.

This Antique Colonial spent years in a Central Massachusetts barn before it was reassembled in West Newbury. An addition expanded it to five bedrooms without thumbing its nose at history.

The dining room has exposed beams, shiplap, and modern touches.

By John R. Ellement

March 6, 2024

4 minutes to read

134 Indian Hill St., West Newbury

$1,895,000

Style Antique Colonial

Year built 1730/1986

Square feet 4,918

Bedrooms 5

Baths 3 full, 2 half

Water/Sewer Private (Title 5 not completed)

Taxes $10,199 (2024)

Homes are usually built to stay in one place, but this Colonial made the trek from the far stretches of Worcester County to its new home in Essex County, roughly 80 miles away.

First built in North Brookfield in 1730 for Revolutionary War soldier Solomon Goodell, the home was taken apart and stored in a barn in the Central Massachusetts town for years. In 1986, its components were taken to West Newbury and reassembled in a neighborhood full of historic homes.

Today, this house is a deliberate combination of its sturdy history and its much more comfortable present.

The main entrance isn’t front and center. There isn’t a pathway to that door. The driveway splits to the left toward the two-car garage (welcome home) and to the right to additions that offer two ways to enter the house. The covered entrance opens into a breakfast nook with recessed lighting, a banquette, and a drum shade light that looks like a metal whirlwind.

But the best combination of past and present is in the kitchen, where the original king pine wide-plank flooring supports stainless steel appliances, and an original brick-lined wood-burning fireplace is brightened by two tracks of LED lights crossing the ceiling. The kitchen is 298 square feet and also features a soapstone-topped island with seating for six, a wood-burning fireplace with a bluish-gray surround and a brick hearth, and a padded bench. The cabinets are gray, and the counters are soapstone.

The kitchen comes with an island and a bench.

The kitchen has a working fireplace for those cold March mornings.

A doorway in the kitchen opens into a foyer with the aforementioned front entrance. On the right, there is an office that displays the original ceiling beams. After you log off from work for the day, take a nap in the 149-square-foot sitting room. Here, one can access the first entrance off the driveway, as well as a half bath with wood flooring.

This main floor office is accessed from the foyer and the sitting room.

The home has hardwood flooring and a lot of places to relax.

Back out in the foyer, a doorway on the right leads to the 168-square-foot formal dining room, which evokes a more modern vibe than the rest of the house. It features a shiplap wall, but the original ceiling beams and king pine flooring. There are candle sconces on the walls, but light now comes from a modern five-bulb fixture.

Guests can use the half bath off the kitchen, which features tile flooring and a vessel sink.

A short hallway off the kitchen connects to the living room. Here the home’s history shines, with the original wood-burning fireplace, exposed beams, and flooring.

The half bath is in a hallway off the kitchen.

The home features the original exposed beams.

A sliding barn door in the breakfast nook opens to an addition carefully designed to honor the home’s history. From outside, it looks like a breezeway, but it contains a sunny 238-square foot family room with skylights, built-in bookshelves, and wide-planked flooring that mimics the original wood found elsewhere in the house.

The sunroom has built-ins, walls of windows, and skylights.

At the end of the family room, there is a seamless connection to a two-story addition that includes the primary suite on the top level and a two-car garage, workout room, and mudroom with ceramic tile flooring.

Here the entrance to the primary suite is guarded by a sliding barn door. The suite offers a 255-square-foot bedroom space, a pair of walk-in closets, four windows, clerestory windows, recessed lighting, and hardwood flooring.

The primary bath features a double vanity, hardwood flooring, a soaking tub, and a shower behind glass doors with a gray subway tile surround.

The laundry room is also part of this addition.

The primary suite is part of the addition and offers privacy.

The primary suite bath offers a dual vanity with waterfall edges. Keep your toothbrush on your own side, dear.

The primary suite features a soaking tub.

The primary suite shower has room for two.

The laundry room has a sink for soaking those extra-dirty clothes.

Back in the original part of the house, the second floor holds a 124-square-foot bedroom suite with a wood-burning fireplace, shower-only bath, walk-in closet, a closet nestled into a nook, and a double-door closet. There’s also an office, a main bath with a tub-shower combination and a pedestal sink, and two roughly 140-square-foot bedrooms. One has a walk-in closet.

The third level is home to the final bedroom and a 143-square-foot bonus room, both of which have exposed beams and wall-to-wall carpeting.

This bedroom is actually a suite with its own bathroom.

This full bathroom is part of the suite.

The top floor offers a bonus room and a bedroom with a double-door closet.

The home sits on 5.38 acres and has an expansive stone patio.

The home sits on a 5.38-acre lot with a patio.

Wendy L. Willis of Keller Williams Realty Evolution in Newburyport has the listing. As of press time, an offer had been accepted on the home.

Follow John R. Ellement on Twitter @JREbosglobe. Send listings to [email protected]. Please note: We do not feature unfurnished homes unless they are new-builds and will not respond to submissions we won’t pursue.