“We did it ourselves,” Evelyn says, “all swinging
sledgehammers, shovels, hammers, and tire irons.”
SHAKER LIFE | SPRING 2014 37
Greenes have made their half remarkably
spacious-seeming with four bedrooms,
including the third floor – inhabited by
their daughter Margaret – and two-anda
half baths.
In their 30s and fresh from out of
town, the Greenes bought the house
from Jim and Sylvia Ullman, Sylvia being
well-known in town in those years as
the owner of American Crafts Gallery
on Larchmere Boulevard. The Greenes
bought the duplex because of the
financial advantages inherent in having
a renter on one side. They loved Shaker
but couldn’t afford the sort of home they
wanted in a neighborhood they liked,
which included Fernway.
But, Evelyn says, “the duplex gave us a
beautifully designed, well-built home with
a big yard in a great neighborhood, all the
room we needed, and the rental income
eventually paid our mortgage. We’ve had
only three tenants since 1985.”
And when it became time to fish
or cut bait regarding their retirement
decision, the Greenes chose to cast their
line on the Kenmore side. They had been
living in the Ingleside half for 26 years
and had to wait until their Kenmore
tenants left in February to begin work.
And work they did.
First, the Interior
As befitting its pedigree, the house’s
bones are rock-solid, a fact confirmed
when Dave and Evelyn – along with
daughter Margaret, her boyfriend
Elliott Konicki, and some of their more
able-bodied friends – began a room-byroom,
floor-by-floor demolition in
February 2012.
“We did it ourselves,” Evelyn says,
“all swinging sledgehammers, shovels,
hammers, and tire irons. We completely
gutted every wall and ceiling in the house,
down to the studs. It was still 1928
behind the walls: the original knob-andtube
wiring, virtually no insulation,
cracked plaster.”