A 1963 home that once graced the pages of House Beautiful in 1969 and became an obsession for local man of style Joe Posch (The Supergay Detroit Blogger) has just been listed for sale. But shhhh... real estate agent Bob Barto confirms that it is a "pocket sale," so you won't find the listing on Trulia or Zillow. Tricky! The asking price is $1,995,000 and they promise that the main change to the original design is a bigger kitchen.
So who is Hakwins Ferry anyway? And if the listing is not online, does it really exist?
We learned from Supergay about Ferry's design pedigree. He is best known for writing the definitive book on Detroit architecture, The Buildings of Detroit. This heir to the Ferry Seed Company fortune attended Cranbrook and became a Harvard-trained architect and architectural historian studying under under the Bauhaus greats Walter Gropius and Marcel Breuer. He was a trustee of the DIA from 1960 to his death, and sat on the Collector’s Committee, the group that decides on art acquisitions for the museum. He was also president of the Friends of Modern Art for years.
In constructing his home, Ferry wanted to take advantage of lake views, enhance the views with an open floor plan, and create gallery-like space for a huge modern art collection. What resulted was a home so stylish that House Beautiful put it on the cover in 1969.
And while the home still appears to be in great shape, the real estate agents for the home seem not to share Ferry's stylish modern aesthetic when it came to laying out the brochure we received in the mail. Sure, not everyone is a gifted graphic designer, but it would have been nice to see something more worthy of the home's class. Hop back over to Supergay to see it the way it was meant to be.
· Hawkins Ferry: The Original A-Gay [Supergay Detroit]
· "House Beautiful" is right! [Supergay Detroit]
· 874 Lake Shore Rd, Grosse Pointe Shores, MI[Zillow]
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