Homeland – Baltimore Magazine

The Margaret Cleveland in Bolton Hill is an Experience for All the Senses

Janelle Diamond — Wed, 19 Apr 2023 14:34:09 +0000

Owner Chris Heller in his Bolton Hill store. —Photography by Marlayna Demond

It’s hard to believe that Christopher Heller didn’t grow up in Baltimore.

The 46-year-old owner of the enchanted Margaret Cleveland home and garden shop in Bolton Hill is an avid city bike rider, a graduate of the master gardener program at University of Maryland Extension, and the newly minted owner of the beloved Walther Gardens, the northeast Baltimore nursery and gift shop with the oldest snowball stand in the country.

Not bad for a kid from Lancaster, who was always dreaming of bigger things. After graduating from college with a graphic design degree from the Art Institute in Philadelphia, Heller found himself working as a creative director for a dot-com start-up. That job landed him a bigger job in Florida, and while he watched his career skyrocket, he also missed the other things that brought him joy, including painting, floral design, and landscaping. In 2004 he decided to take a chance and start his own brand development firm, Helium Creative.

A few years after Heller started Helium, he hired a smart guy named Ryan Sirois to serve as head graphic designer, and the attraction was instantaneous. The two married in 2015 and their twins, Connor and Olivia, were born in 2017. Between marriage and babies, they also bought a Lancaster fixer-upper to serve as home base when they visited from Florida, and act as an Airbnb in between. “I spent 10 days ripping it apart. It was the first time I was able to be creative again,” Heller says.

As the toddlers approached their second birthday, Heller and Ryan Sirois Heller began wondering if Florida was where they wanted to raise their family. “We wanted them to be raised up north, to have seasons, and be in a place they could be enriched and grow into the beings they are supposed to be,” says Heller.

Lancaster was too far from the airport, Georgetown too expensive, and Philadelphia just didn’t feel right. On a whim, Heller drove into Homeland one afternoon on his way to the airport. “This neighborhood checks off every box, but it’s Baltimore,” he told Ryan. “Baltimore was not at all on our radar.” They flew back the following weekend and looked at 15 houses—taking turns so one could stay in the car with the twins—until they both walked out of one house with the same feeling: “This is it.” They moved into a lakefront stone house in Homeland just in time for Halloween 2019.

Five months later, the pandemic forced Heller to slow down, travel less, and introduced him to Zoom. He realized his Florida-based business could still thrive with him sitting in Baltimore. When he started looking for an office space outside his home, Sirois Heller nudged, “Why don’t you launch the Margaret Cleveland in tandem?” It was an idea that had been brewing—a small, curated shop that would give him the creative outlet he’d been craving.

One day, his bike ride took him to Bolton Hill, and a storefront being used as an accountant’s office across from the restaurant CookHouse caught his eye. He called the owner and asked if they would ever consider selling the property. Five months later, they closed on the building and the Margaret Cleveland, named for his grandmother, a descendant of President Grover Cleveland, was theirs.

Heller may have stumbled across Bolton Hill by chance, but both he and his husband have ties to the neighborhood. Heller’s grandfather once lived on Park Avenue, a block away, and Sirois Heller’s mother attended the Maryland Institute College of Art and lived on the same block were the shop resides. “It’s such a special neighborhood in the city,” Heller says.

They spent the next year renovating—and turning the accounting office into a shop that felt worthy of the grand name. Originally, the walls were orange, the floors a light wood, and the space choppy. Now it’s light, airy, and dreamy, with floor-to-ceiling shelves stocked full of housewares and sweet knickknacks, plants, and gardening finds.

Heller also redid the landscaping, painted the building a light gray, and made it the kind of place where you press your nose against the window to get a glimpse inside.

“It’s the place that you’ve always wanted to go, with all the things you never knew you had to have,” he says. “A curated collection of treasures and keepsakes.”

The doors officially opened in October 2021—just in time for Bolton Hill’s popular Festival on the Hill.

Heller’s big concern was that with one extra thing on his plate he’d be spending more time away from the twins and his husband. “I didn’t want this store to take away from family and being able to be present.” Instead, both Connor and Olivia, now six, have helped unpack boxes and even suggested the family go on an antiquing excursion during a recent trip to Charleston, laughs Heller. “The store is going to add another layer to us both as people and as a family.” Over the holidays, budding salesman Connor presented an ornament to a shopper when she asked him to point out his favorite. “If you get it, you have to get three,” he said earnestly. (She did.) Unlike their other business, this one is tangible. The children can understand the concept and see the process.

The building, which also includes apartments and a courtyard, has allowed Sirois Heller to showcase his art. The carriage house is also being used as a space for his sound healing workshops and Heller’s floral classes.

“This building has allowed both of us space,” says Heller. “We’ve been one with Helium, but now we are each giving each other space to explore outside of Helium.”

He’d love to launch more Margaret Clevelands into the world, but also wonders if it can exist without him. “I want to be the one you are associating with the Margaret Cleveland. It means so much to me.” Right now, that means their hours are mostly “the first weekend of the month, by happenstance, and by appointment.”

“Retail is dying because it’s not what it used to be,” he muses. “But this is experiential. I want people to come in and feel something and be excited.” So far that’s included fresh flowers for Valentine’s Day and s’mores in the courtyard over the holidays.

Now he’s also dreaming of a plot of land off Walther Avenue. He bought Walther Gardens in March. It’s new to him, but he understands the affection the city feels for the shop, especially its neighbors. “That place is everything I’ve ever dreamed of,” he says. The plan is a spring re-opening of Walther and a long list of ideas, including fresh-cut flowers, a demonstration garden, and seasonal treats. The snowball stand will be called “The Peggy” after his great-grandmother.

It seems like a lot of new projects all at once, but Heller has this even-keeled, super-competent way about him that makes you believe he can do anything he sets his mind to. He says it’s his passion that drives him.

“If you don’t have the passion, you’ll never make it in retail. There is so much freaking work that goes into this. But I love it,” he says.

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Hello, Neighbor: Govans

Ethan McLeod — Tue, 01 Mar 2022 23:27:29 +0000

LIVE

The neighborhoods that make up Govans boast a wide range of housing, from traditional rowhomes in Winston-Govans to Victorian and Craftsman houses in Radnor-Winston, and more spacious, luxurious properties in Homeland.

—Dave Cooper Photography

SHOP

The vendors at Govans Farmers’ Market (June-September, Wednesdays 3-6 p.m.) sell locally grown produce and handmade crafts; for secondhand gems visit Illicit Rag Vintage and Wise Penny.

ARTS/CULTURE

Catch a movie at the historic Senator Theatre and tour artist Landry Randriamandroso’s B’more Birds murals along York Road.

PLAY

Get outside and stroll along Chinquapin Run Park or head to the playground, ballfields, basketball courts, or rec center at Dewees Park.

DINE

A dozen options (from ramen and Thai to pizza and lobster rolls) at Belvedere Square; on York Road, try Nailah’s Kitchen, Heritage Smokehouse, Noir, Full Tilt Brewing, Zen West, and Real Deal Jamaican.

“I bought my house in 2005. In this area, you have a little bit of living in the city, with a county feel. I made quick friends with my neighbors—and one of the funniest things I can remember is I didn’t cut my grass right way, and my neighbor said, ‘Hey, do you need a lawnmower?’

What makes living here great is the diversity. We have so much to learn from each other to make the community better and stronger. We have a diverse group of individuals here—masons, doctors, professors, lawyers, civil workers for the city. In a small radius, you can walk down York Road and address basic fundamental needs like health, food, gas, mechanical, salons, barber shops, and spiritual worship. If you want it, it’s there. And if it’s not there, we’re gonna put it there.”

–Christopher Forrest, president of the York Road Partnership, lives in Winston-Govans, one of about a half-dozen widely varying communities that make up greater Govans.

NEIGHBORHOOD STATS

Median household income: $32,674, Winston-Govans; $49,958, Radnor-Winston; $77,813, Belvedere
Estimated rent: $1,045, Richnor Springs; $1,430, Mid-Govans; $2,510, Homeland
Share of residents graduated college: 3 percent, Winston-Govans; 23 percent Rosebank; 31 percent Radnor-Winston

Sources: Live Baltimore and Baltimore Department of Planning

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Heart of the Home

Jess Mayhugh — Mon, 14 Jan 2019 08:30:00 +0000

By Rebecca Kirkman
Photography by Vince Lupo

Home & Living

Heart of the Home

A Homeland kitchen addition makes space for family dinner.

By Rebecca Kirkman.
Photography by Vince Lupo.

When Lilly Hunterand her husband, David, purchased their 1935 Homeland residence in 2008, the working mother of two didn’t see a problem with the original L-shaped kitchen.

Renovation

Architect Penza Bailey Architects Contractor Delbert Adams Construction Group Project manager Kent Darrell Interior designer Leslie Rose of Jenkins Baer Associates

“At the time, we only had a family of four, and I don’t really like to cook, so I never thought the kitchen would be an issue,” recalls Hunter, an obstetrician-gynocologist at Greater Baltimore Medical Center.

But by 2013, the Hunters had grown to a family of five. The kitchen, last remodeled in the 1980s, needed an upgrade. The top priority, Hunter says, was an eat-in space where all five family members could gather for meals, as well as better flow for entertaining.

With the hope that the kitchen could be moved or expanded into another part of their home, the Hunters turned to Penza Bailey Architects. What they ended up with, however, was a 440-square-foot addition—part of a 920-square-foot renovation that provided for a larger foyer, mudroom, powder room, and a bar area leading into the new kitchen.

Extending from the southeast corner of the house, the addition mimics the neighborhood’s traditional early-20th century architecture with stone walls, paned windows, and a copper roof.

“The roof is one of my favorite things, because when it rains and you’re sitting in the kitchen, you have this beautiful sound of the rain landing on the rooftop,” says Hunter. While the roofing material ended up being one of her most treasured parts of the new space, it was actually an element dictated by the neighborhood association.

Designed in 1924, the historic northern Baltimore City neighborhood adheres to architectural standards intended to retain its original look and feel. For the Hunters, that meant submitting plans for the addition to the Homeland Association for approval. Many elements of the final design, from the paned windows and stone exterior to the copper roof, were dictated by the association’s guidelines.

Inside, however, the design blends the 83-year-old home’s traditional details with contemporary finishes. “The homes in our neighborhood are very traditional, and I have a traditional taste. But, as I’ve gotten older, I’ve developed more contemporary tastes,” says Hunter. “So I like this kitchen because it blends those two styles effectively, and it complements the rest of the home.”

White shaker cabinets with crown molding brighten the space without challenging the traditional aesthetic, while chrome drawer pulls and knobs, a white subway tile backsplash, and a white marble countertop add a touch of contemporary style. Bright red bistro-style bar stools echo the color of the knobs on the industrial-style range and add a vibrant pop to the otherwise monochromatic kitchen. A vaulted ceiling, so-called recessed “can lights,” and double paned doors leading to the patio flood the space with light.

To help her pick the finishes, Hunter relied on designer Leslie Rose of Jenkins Baer Associates.

“I’m a full-time working mom, and she helped me with everything from the knobs and the color of the floors to the light fixtures and the window treatments,” says Hunter. “She was really helpful in paying attention to those many small details that seemed overwhelming to me.”

The biggest change, however, has been the way the Hunter family uses their kitchen. “It’s jaw-dropping when people walk in and see this kitchen compared to what it used to look like,” Hunter says with a laugh, noting that as guests progress through the renovated areas, the kitchen is the big reveal. “We get a lot of ‘oohs’ and ‘ahs’ when people come in.” Now, the space is large enough for the entire family to sit around the island for meals and for guests to hang out where they always seem to while entertaining—the kitchen.

“It gave me my family back,” says Hunter. “We spend most of our day in the kitchen, be it meals, homework, or just catching up. It’s really the center of our home.”

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Out of Africa

Aaron Hope — Wed, 28 Mar 2018 08:00:00 +0000

By Christina Breda Antoniades
Photography By Vince Lupo

Home & Living

Out of Africa

Far from her roots, classical radio host Judith Krummeck revels in a recent renovation—and in her two cultural identities.

By Christina Breda Antoniades. Photography By Vince Lupo.

Classical radio host Judith Krummeck blends her two cultural backgrounds inside her home.

She’s about 8,000 miles from the city of her birth and 20 years into a solidly successful Baltimore life, but in the “deliciously Northern Hemisphere” Homeland duplex she calls home, classical radio host and author Judith Krummeck is never far from her roots.

Gliding through the first-floor rooms just a few weeks after contractors wrapped up a renovation last fall, Krummeck details some of the touches that tie into her life in South Africa, where she was born and reared (save a childhood stint in Namibia) and where she met American husband Douglas Blackstone, who was then manager of the National Symphony Orchestra in Johannesburg.

In the living room, there’s the watercolor of a beach on the southern coast of South Africa, and not far away, over the grand piano the couple shipped from Johannesburg—it survived the journey without a scratch—is a dreamy print of wildebeest by South African artist Gordon Vorster.

The living room is home to a host of items from the couple’s lives in South Africa, from the grand piano, to a pine coffee table, to their book collection.

in the home’s front hallway, newly refinished hardwood flooring matches the adjacent rooms and a painting by Krummeck’s mother hangs in the stairwell.

In the hallway, Krummeck, a youthful 60-something, points to a framed painting by her mother—a tribute to the slaves once housed in Cape Town’s District 6. In the kitchen, there’s the rustic pine table that is both functional and intriguing. After buying it, she discovered two surprises: the beautifully distressed wood hiding under an enamel covering, and, on the underside of the drawer, the words “BOK polish” and “SAP” burned into the wood in block letters. She guesses the drawer was made from an old crate used for boot polish belonging to the South African Police.

There’s more, from artwork to knickknacks to the silver butter cooler passed down by her paternal grandmother. They’re reminders of “this whole other history” from a country that’s had its share of negative times—apartheid is on that list—but that also has great beauty. “For a while, I felt as if I didn’t belong anywhere, and that was a bit disconcerting,” says Krummeck, who most closely identifies as a Capetonian. “But more and more, I feel the privilege of being able to lay claim to two countries and cultures, and I love that.”

In her office there are more ties to family, including the bookcase made by her grandfather and a set of inkwells given to the aspiring writer by her brother, actor and author Peter Krummeck, who died in 2013.

Renovations to the basement created a warm and welcoming guest room/entertainment room and freed an upstairs space for Krummeck’s office.

That she’s in Baltimore at all is a bit of a fluke. “We sort of put a pin in the map,” Krummeck says of the couple’s decision in 1997 to move to the States. That pin brought them first to the D.C. area and then to Wheeling, West Virginia, where Blackstone managed an orchestra. “But there was really nothing for me to do,” laments Krummeck. A quick look at her resume might explain the mismatch: Her career had included stints as an actress, work in both TV and radio, and as the arts editor for SAfm at the South African Broadcasting Corp.

Then she stumbled across a listing for an on-air position at WBJC, Baltimore’s classical radio station. She landed the job (hers is the gorgeously accented voice that delights evening drive-time listeners) and was soon Charm City-bound.

The office includes a bookcase made by Krummeck's grandfather and a set of inkwells given to the aspiring writer by her brother.

Blackstone finished his contract in Wheeling “and then he generously followed me,” says Krummeck. (He’s now director of the continuing-education Odyssey Program at The Johns Hopkins University.) They moved first to an apartment in The Ambassador, and though they loved it, the couple was soon looking to set down roots. “I just felt it was not only the sensible thing to own property, but that I needed to do that in terms of belonging,” says Krummeck. “I felt I wanted to have some sort of footprint.”

It was a real-estate agent who first alerted her to a duplex home built in 1936 on a quiet cul-de-sac in Homeland, but Krummeck quickly shifted her attention to the attached home, which was also for sale. “This one was even cheaper because it was such a wreck,” says Krummeck. “The ceilings had sagged on the upper level, the floors were in very bad shape, and there was linoleum in the entrance hall and the kitchen that all had to come up.” Throw in some scuffed walls plus “grime in every nook and crevice” and you have what might have looked to some like a daunting prospect.

Not to Krummeck, who says that “as disgusting as it was when we walked in, I could just see the bones. I knew that I could make it a home.”

The couple got to work clearing “festoons of cobwebs” and dealing with mystery gunk—“I won’t even tell you what was in the bottom of the basement fridge,” Krummeck says with a laugh. Out came the oddball additions, including plastic faux bricks in the kitchen, some “very haphazard quasi-Tudor beams,” and the inch-and-a-half-thick layer of linoleum. A host of small projects followed, spread out over the years (Blackstone credits Krummeck with much of that handiwork). But it started to get exhausting: “We got the place as far as we could and then really just ran out of energy,” Krummeck says.

The walls in the master bedroom/library suite are coated in Benjamin Moore Midsummer Night, a dramatic shade of brown-gray-black that allows for Moorish design elements to pop.

Enter the experts: “Most renovation stories are absolute horror stories, but ours, with a company called C&H Restoration and Renovation, just could not be better,” says Krummeck. “What was wonderful is how well they listened. I would say something and then they would come up with an idea that would match or improve it.” The renovation involved more than the usual level of trust—Krummeck and Blackstone were out of town for the initial three weeks of the renovation. Over the next two-and-a-half months, the contractor transformed the first floor and basement.

In the dining room, that meant dealing with layers of wallpaper, replacing the crown moulding and a built-in cupboard, and finally ditching the “horrible wainscoting,” a previous owner’s do-it-yourself project, says Blackstone.

In the kitchen, a new hardwood floor replaced the cork flooring Krummeck had painstakingly installed after moving in. The small-but-cozy kitchen now features a handsome farmhouse sink, recovered-wood shelves, a new countertop, and cabinets from Ikea that complement existing cabinetry.

The renovation also meant making full use of the home’s three floors by upgrading the basement, previously a dry but decidedly unwelcoming space. “I don’t like living in a house where I don’t feel like I can use every bit of it, so the biggest part of the work was down there,” Krummeck says of the basement, which now features a television room that doubles as a guest suite. “The transformation was indescribable,” she says. The new space, with a working fireplace and rustic look—including a faux-painted floor in the utility room—is now “probably our most popular space,” says Blackstone.

One bonus to the renovation was that it freed up an upstairs guest room, which now serves as Krummeck’s office. It’s here that she does the bulk of her writing (Krummeck earned an MFA in creative writing and publishing arts from University of Baltimore and in 2014 published Beyond the Baobab, a book of essays reflecting on themes tied to immigration, identity, and home).

The dining room was one of the rooms most transformed in a recent renovation.

She’s now about two-thirds of the way through her next book, the story of her great-great-grandmother, Sarah Barker, who immigrated from England to Africa in 1815. Though she’d long heard about her great-great-grandfather, a well-documented missionary, Krummeck dug deep into the life of his lesser-known wife, who “seems by all accounts to be the most remarkable woman.”

She has other book projects in mind for the future, but radio fans shouldn’t worry about her abandoning the microphone. Though she’s clocked 20 years at WBJC, she still revels in the work. “It’s such a huge repertoire that you’re constantly learning, so it’s a wonderful mix of that newness and also the familiarity of the framework that is a radio station,” she says. And her vocal work pairs nicely with her written work, making them fine companions for a double career, she says.

What she won’t likely tackle any time soon are more renovations. “I actually think we’ve finally put the full stop on it,” she says with a smile. “For the moment, we certainly feel that we’re done.”

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