Modern Restoration of Historic Harlem House

 Harlem, New York, United States

Architects: MESH Architectures

Interior Design: John Eric Sebesta

Photography © Frank Oudeman

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MESH Architectures designed the restoration to a single-family house, salvaging antique woodwork, while bringing the house up to passive-house standards. The result is a home full of 19th-century detail that is stingy with energy use and full of fresh air. 

Within our recently completed renovation of a Harlem Brownstone, modern design elements coexist with the persistent history of past architectural approaches. 

The house is large by New York City standards: a cellar plus four stories. The kitchen and dining room are located on the ground floor (English basement), leading out to a garden in the rear. The living room and library are on the parlor level. The master bedroom and home office/guest room are located on the 3rd floor, with four daughters in four bedrooms on the fourth. The cellar, which was previously a mechanical space, was excavated and renovated into a home gym and media room.

Preserved historical details appear at dramatic moments throughout Harlem Brownstone renovation, like portals and pathways into another time.

New materials are incorporated at a variety of different scales, allowing them to harmoniously coexist with the old.