HCC celebrates a century of Heights homes with annual tour

A 1920s Fairmount Boulevard home.

It’s the Roaring ‘20s—World War I is over, women have the vote, jazz is king, and the Harlem Renaissance is in full swing. . . . Heights Community Congress (HCC) invites everyone to come along and enjoy a taste of the Jazz Age as it presents "Heights, Homes . . . and All That Jazz!” on Sept. 17 and 18.

The 2016 Heritage Home & Garden Tour and preview party pay homage to the 1920s and the century that followed, and continue HCC’s fall tradition of sponsoring a look inside many of Cleveland Heights’s most spectacular homes and gardens.

This year’s tour showcases seven homes, three of which also feature gardens, and one stand-alone garden.

Celebrating Heights Libraries’ centennial, and honoring the Heights Observer, HCC kicks off this year’s tour with a preview party on Saturday, Sept. 17, 6:30–11 p.m., at Ensemble Theatre, 2843 Washington Blvd. (in the Coventry School building).

Party guests are encouraged to dress the part, dust off their beads and feathers, and channel their inner Jay Gatsby or Daisy Buchanan as they enjoy live jazz performed by the Summit City Jazz Quintet. They’ll also get to mix and mingle with actors from the Ensemble Theatre Group as they recreate Gatsby-era vignettes, and taste delicacies catered by The Fairmount. Preview partygoers will also have the unique opportunity to tour select homes in advance.

Preview party tickets are $125 per person, and include admission to the preview party as well as the full home and garden tour on Sunday, Sept. 18, and a tour book. Purchase tickets to the preview party by contacting the HCC office by e-mail (info@heightscongress.org) or by phone (216-321-6775).

The homes featured on this year’s tour are a testament to a century of building and to the variety of houses that characterize Cleveland Heights. Classic mansions on and around Fairmount Boulevard abound with features typical of the grand homes built in the early 1900s: butler’s pantries, hand-painted murals, leaded glass windows, chandeliers, crown molding, rich wood paneling, French doors, and transformed servants’ quarters—along with renovated kitchens to serve today’s culinary tastes.

These historic homes are juxtaposed with a contemporary home built a century later, in 2015, by the owner-architect. This sleek, light-filled, minimalist interior space features stunning photography—it's a space where a man—and his beloved dog—can be at one with the out-of-doors.

The tour also features more modest, but still exceptional, homes built between the 1920s and 1950s, which have been uniquely renovated and creatively transformed.

Also on the tour is an elegant garden with carefully chosen plantings, as well as an amphitheater that evokes a bygone era.

This year’s Home & Garden Tour takes place on Sunday, Sept. 18, noon to 6 p.m. It is self-guided, and each ticket includes a tour book.

Tickets are available for $20 per person through Sept. 11. Purchase them online at www.heightscongress.org, by calling 216-321-6775, or by visiting the HCC office at 2222 N. Taylor Road (inside Hope Lutheran Church). 

Beginning Sept. 12, the price for all tickets increases to $25 per person. On that date, tickets will go on sale at a number of local merchants, listed on HCC’s website. For group discounts, contact Martha Goble at 216-321-6775. 

 

Pam Wetherill

Pam Wetherill is an HCC volunteer. She serves on the Fair Housing Committee and is a resident of University Heights.

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Volume 9, Issue 9, Posted 11:51 AM, 09.01.2016