Luxury Homes

Nine fireplaces and a courtyard: How far $20 million stretches on Beacon Hill

This nearly two-century-old home stands out in Boston’s luxury market at a time when many properties are in glass skyscrapers, its listing agent said.

In this sitting area, more wood paneling frames in windows that extend nearly from the floor to the ceiling and overlook the home’s vine-covered courtyard. Jack Vatcher

By Victor Stefanescu

March 20, 2024

3 minutes to read

From one set of windows on the top floor of this $20 million, six-story home in Beacon Hill, the next owner can gaze westbound at the Prudential Center and Cambridge banks of the Charles, and from a second, right at Former US Secretary of State John Kerry’s home on the other side of Louisburg Square.

This nearly two-century-old home with 7,424 gross square feet of living space sits in a neighborhood that listing agent Tracy Campion said stands out in Boston’s luxury market at a time when many properties are in glass skyscrapers.

“You’re buying a piece of history here,” Campion, the broker of Campion and Company, said of the four-bedroom home at 22 Louisburg Square with five bathrooms and two half-baths.

Wisteria, more than a century old, extends up the façade of this townhouse sitting at the corner of the square. Its red brick matches the sidewalks in the storied neighborhood where the Massachusetts State House sits only a few blocks away.

Through the front door, one’s greeted by a spiraling staircase covered with a red running carpet. In the double-parlor living room adjacent to the staircase and main hallway, the original quarter sawn oak floors in a parquet pattern mark the floors. An Italian-marble fireplace also dating back to 1835 heats up this living space.

The home’s library, fitted with wood-paneling on the walls and built-in shelving, is the kind of work space fit for CEOs, which makes sense, given that the home previously belonged to the once-chief executive of a theater company. Dual nooks large enough for desks look out through expansive windows, one to Pinckney Street and the other at the home’s courtyard.

The home’s primary gathering spaces sit one floor lower, including a dining room Campion said is “very European.”

A kitchenette reaches from this room to a sitting area overlooking the courtyard. Here, more wood paneling frames in windows that extend nearly from the floor to the ceiling and overlook the home’s vine-covered courtyard. At one point, a previous owner painted what looks like a scene from the Italian countryside onto one of the walls of the exterior space.

One can reach the courtyard from a family room — outfitted as a billiards space anchored by one of the townhouse’s nine fireplaces — connecting to the kitchen. Nowadays, Campion says a lot of kitchens are front-and-center in a home.

“But I love the way this is tucked back and still [looks] over a family room that goes out to the garden,” she said.

The Kitchen’s Wolf range has traditional gas cooktops but also a flat top. Down another set of stairs, there’s a basement space the previous owner set up as a home theater.

The home’s primary bedroom sits a floor above the main entrance overlooking the private park at the center of the square, which is enclosed by a cast-iron fence. Two ensuite bathrooms with marble countertops serve the bedroom painted in gleaming whites and accented with pink drapes. The suite also features a dressing room that feels nearly as large as the bedroom.

Two additional bedrooms with ensuite bathrooms featuring marble floors sit one floor higher and a guest suite with exposed beams makes up the top floor. From here, one can look across Boston and down upon the neighborhood.

Campion said home ownership in the square and on Beacon Hill has changed recently as young families have been moving in. Prospective buyers from around the world are going to take a look at the home, she said.

“We’re lucky enough to have people that can afford them and keep up the square,” Campion said of the neighborhood’s homes. “Because they’re expensive — but they’re beautiful.”