Lila's Blog

Miraculous Migrating Monarchs

2009-11-09T15:56:00.002-05:00

Just about now, millions of monarch butterflies are arriving at their winter resting place in the forest shelters of the mountain village of Angangueo Mexico. And why do I know this riveting fact? Because one of the most miraculous events I ever witnessed was the migration of these monarch butterflies along the Rhode Island coast. And when it was over, I needed to know more about this intriguing phenomenon.

On a Sunday morning in 2004, my husband and I sat with friends overlooking the ocean, relishing the calm of September in Charlestown. As the sun began to take the chill off the morning air, we spotted a monarch butterfly just above the dune grass… seconds later there were several more… and within minutes we found ourselves among a flurry of fluttering wings. In the distance we could see that there were hundreds more monarchs along the beach, so we quickly headed across the road and began what turned into a two hour walk along the beach in the company of thousands of migrating monarchs.

As I said, at the time I knew nothing about this phenomenon. So the following day I headed off to find a book about these captivating creatures (that I cannot bring myself to call insects). I purchased one aptly titled “The Monarch” by Eric Grace. And then I found more information at www.monarchwatch.org, where I signed up to receive updates about this annual migration. I continue to virtually follow them every year.

The short story (if you want the long one, you'll have to buy the book or go googling) is that at the first signs of frost each year, monarchs begin a journey of thousands of miles from Canada and the United States to the 13,500 foot inactive volcano of Cerro Pelón just west of Mexico City. There they spend the winter months blanketing fir trees, in a state of semi-hibernation, until the warm spring winds call them back north. Thousands of miles... can you imagine… these delicate little fluttering things traveling all that way… with no GPS systems!

I see many monarchs in Charlestown every September and October. Some days I have even seen hundreds. But nothing has ever been quite like that Sunday in 2004. Last year I did witness the scene in this photograph as I headed out for an evening walk, where as the sun began to descend, the monarchs were all nestled together for the night on the pine trees near my house. Some day I will migrate myself to Cerro Pelón to see the end result of what I experienced that September morning. In the meantime, the memory of it will have to sustain me!

Lila Delman Real Estate hosts European Colleagues

2009-11-06T11:54:00.001-05:00

Lila Delman Real Estate Hosts European Colleagues at Christie's Global Annual Conference

Christies Great Estates Newsletter

The Christie's Great Estates Global Annual Conference took place last week in Boston, Massachusetts, with 60 affiliate firms represented- 40 percent of which were outside the United States.

Rear Row L to R: Jose Ribes Bas, Rimontgo, Valencia Spain; Philip Sherry, SherryFitzgerald, Dublin, Ireland; Ueli Schnorf, Wetag Consulting, Ticino, Switzerland

Front Row L to R: Robin Nicholson, Melanie Delman, Catherine Gazder of Lila Delman Real Estate

Lila Delman Real Estate hosts European colleagues.

The principals of three European affiliates traveled south to Newport, Rhode Island, after the Global Annual Conference in Boston to visit properties represented by Lila Delman Real Estate. Jose Ribas Bas of Rimontgo in Spain, Philip Sherry of SherryFitzgerald in Ireland and Ueli Schnorf of Wetag, Switzerland joined Melanie Delman, Robin Nicholson and Catherine Gazder of Lila Delman on a tour of the Carnegie Abbey Club and other prominent offerings. "We were thrilled to introduce our friends from Spain, Switzerland and Ireland to Newport, Rhode Island," says Melanie Delman, company president. "Everyone especially enjoyed cocktails at Oakwood, one of our premier listings."

The Kinder, Gentler NFL

2009-11-03T14:20:00.010-05:00

In these tough times, people all over the world are reaching out to others for a connection, comfort, and care. Before my very eyes, even the NFL is becoming soft. Kinder. Gentler. More aware. More compassionate and thoughtful. Yep. You heard me right…Have you noticed? It’s not Larry Czonka’s world anymore. Or Dick Butkus’, or even Bill Romanowski’s.

I’ve never really been a fan of the ‘pass interference’ penalty. It’s football, after all, not ballet.

The designed purpose of the game is to interfere with the other team scoring more points, right? I’m still trying to wrap my head around that age-old penalty. And now, as you football fans know, over the past few years, the list of penalties has been growing.

You still can’t touch a guy when he’s trying to catch a pass. You can’t hit the quarterback in certain ways when he’s trying to throw the ball. Did you catch that ‘tripping’ penalty last weekend? Really? You can’t trip? In the NFL???? SOFT. For me, the kicker (no pun intended) is, stay away from the punter. Actually, just don’t even look at him when it’s punt time. You’ll get 5 to 15 for sure. Yes, kinder and gentler.

But it doesn’t stop there. Even ‘off the field’, it seems that the NFL teams are attempting to connect more with their fans on a personal level. During the month of October, we witnessed the AFL teams wearing their ‘throwback’ uniforms to celebrate 50 years in the NFL. Are they trying to keep their ‘older’ audience by reminding us what our teams used to look like ‘back in the day’, just in case we forgot?

Then, there was all of the pink. I was amazed. Pink shoes. Pink sweat bands. Pink socks.…not something you connect with the bad boys of football. Pink, in recognition of National Breast Cancer Awareness month. Unheard of. Really kind of nice when you think about it. Pink is the new black. I like it. Seems like they’re reaching out, maybe trying to relate to us, the fans.

The very next week, I witnessed the first penalty of the game (probably roughing the kicker!) being called in Spanish. WOW! The NFL was observing National Hispanic Heritage month. Have you ever heard of them observing anything like it? I’m telling you...something’s up. And it’s so cool. (Muy bueno)

Finally, the Patriots and the Buccaneers went to London to play a football game. What in the world? Football Save the Queen? They don’t even play American football in England. Did they return to the motherland for some sort of penance? The world just got smaller yet again. And I think I like it. Do you think that the NFL needs us? Do they need to appeal to us as humans in order to keep our loyalty? I think they might, and, again, I think I like it.

I am so excited to see where this is leading. I love football, and it’s great to see them connecting on our level. Maybe in 2010, we’ll be watching Sports Center, and there he is, Chris Berman, interviewing Tom Brady. ‘So, Tom, what are you hoping for during the next season?’, asks Chris. And reaching out to the fans and to the world, Tom’s answer is: ‘The Championship, of course, Chris. ….Oh, and world peace.’

A rising tide lifts all boats

2009-10-20T12:25:00.014-04:00

A rising tide lifts all boats This aphorism, coined by John F. Kennedy, describes the idea that when an economy is performing well, all people will benefit from it.

American expressions, so I have found, differ from the French language, which is particularly rife with culinary-inspired idioms. Stumbling onto a French blog, Chocolate and Zucchini, I found that edible expressions abound, as thier love for food is used to reflect life.

Having a long day? "Long comme un jour sans pain." A literal translation would be, "As long as a day without bread," and it is used to express that something is very long -- in reference to physical length (a long road, a long list) or, more frequently, to the duration of an event (a long speech, a long wait) -- and dreary, like the news last year, when it was all so dreary.

A good way to reach a compromise: "Couper la poire en deux." It means, literally, "cutting the pear in two," if two people want the same pear, halving it is the most equitable way to settle the dispute.

Running out of steam in the middle of the day? The French expression would be - "Retomber comme un soufflé." Literally translated as, "Falling back like a soufflé," or running out of steam in a quick and sudden way.

Not feeling well?"Ne pas être dans son assiette", translated as, "not being in one's plate," it is a colloquial expression that means feeling under the weather, being out of sorts, physically or emotionally.

What would be the equivalent American expression of this?
"Ménager la chèvre et le chou." Translated as, "Accommodating the goat and the cabbage," trying to please both sides in a situation where the two parties are in fact irreconcilable. It is equivalent to the English expression, "running with the hare and hunting with the hounds," but it is a lot more common.

Julia Child always used cooking to demonstrate her delight in life. As she once said, "If you're afraid of butter, just put in some cream." I love her for that!

Chasing James Coburn Through SoHo

2009-10-18T15:09:00.006-04:00

I used to regularly visit New York City and somehow, over time, I have stopped doing that. During the 80s, I used to go at least once a month. My friends and I would go mostly to look at art but also for the shopping and the general, hectic and crazy ambience.

Sometimes we would go to one of the museums to see a really good exhibition but mostly we would visit galleries. Not so much the staid and hushed uptown galleries but we always made a beeline for SoHo.

Endlessly appealing and fascinating with its many cast iron buildings, street vendors, and beautiful architecture, there was never a dull moment there for me. The place was noisy, maybe a little dirty, and filled with people of all sorts, young and old. But as opposed to the uptown galleries, the places I loved in SoHo had their doors flung open right at street level and the inside and outside really were meshed. I always felt welcome there. And there was so much to see.

One night, while at Leo Castelli, we spotted James Coburn. He was there with a young and beautiful model on his arm and they only had eyes for each

other. Because we remembered him from our teenage years in those movies Our Man Flint and In Like Flint, James Bond spoofs, we had some sort of connection to him.

Of course, he looked older and grayer, but he was very recognizable. We followed them from gallery to gallery until we tired of it and went for dinner in Chinatown or maybe Little Italy. We never had any intention of speaking to him and there was no point to it. But somehow we had such fun doing absolutely nothing of importance.

I probably would not follow a movie star around now just for fun and knowing that has made me think that I have changed in more than the obvious ways. When did I get so boring? So bored? I think it must be time for an adventure!

Thanks for Giving

2009-10-14T15:12:00.002-04:00

This year Thanksgiving means more to me. My husband and I both have good jobs, our children and parents are healthy, the cars start every morning (knock on wood), and we have a roof over our heads. But many of our fellow Rhode Islanders are not so lucky.

Across the state many of my friends are out of work. Every day the local newspaper is filled with foreclosure notices. And this year families everywhere will struggle to put Thanksgiving dinner on the table. The amount of need in this state is almost paralyzing.

The Newport Office of Lila Delman Real Estate has again decided that this year we will make sure one less family will go without a Thanksgiving dinner. We are adopting a family through our local Child & Family Services and will supply them with a basket full of non-perishable goods for their holiday dinner. Our office is large so we are adopting a family of 8-10 people, but there are families of all sizes in need.

If you’d like to help, here are a few agencies on Aquidneck Island participating in the Thanksgiving basket program:

Child and Family is seeking donors for both of their Holiday Giving Programs. If you would like to donate food baskets for Thanksgiving to families in need and/or toys and gifts for children during the winter holiday season, then they would love to hear from you. Please call or e-mail Landa Patterson, Coordinator of Volunteer Services, at lpatterson@childandfamilyri.com or 401-848-4210 to learn more and sign up.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Center Holiday Basket Program, 401-846-4828.

If you’re unable to adopt a family and just want to drop off some food, contact your local shelters and food banks. The RI Community Food Bank is a great place to start. www.rifoodbank.org

Thanks for Giving!

Hip to be poor

2009-10-03T11:26:00.010-04:00

I feel like I’ve been waiting for this day all my life…it’s finally hip to be poor. Celebrities, industrialists, investment bankers all feel the sting. Waitresses, lawyers, fishermen, brain surgeons, we all share the same leaking boat now. Almost exactly a year ago, the entire country sat mesmerized before the sight of the stock market in freefall, frozen like deer in the headlights at the sight of our retirement funds, college accounts, life savings, hopes, dreams & reasons for living dissolving into thin air. Hello…Can you say "new reality"? Today you can’t open a magazine or newspaper without being bombarded by inane suggestions on how to save what little money you have left – switch from Starbucks to Dunkin! Shop at Wal-Mart! Buy generic! Olay instead of La Mer! – stratagems with about as much effectiveness as trying to stop an incoming tide with a sieve, and which offer the added stupidity of relying upon the same consumerist paradigm that got us here in the first place - buy this instead of that. Save more by spending…less. Discussion of dwindling finances is the subject du jour in the public forums, and if you want to participate in the conversation, you’d better be prepared to talk poor. It’s the chic thing to be. Poor is the new green. In the red is the new black.

This new hipness takes many forms. Some people are of course really poor. Homeless poor, hungry poor, street person poor. People sleeping on subway grates, wearing plastic garbage bags instead of clothes. Others are newly desperate, the foreclosure & short sale & unemployed poor. Many are recent arrivals to poordom, members of the struggling and debt-ridden middle class. And then of course there are the relatively affluent but still less-rich-than-they-were upper strata. Regardless of where you stand on the scale, you’ve probably had some sort of unpleasant reality to adjust to over the past 12 months. If you’re lucky, you’ve done some thinking as well.

Because that’s the one thing that no one has really been addressing – the thinking that landed us in this mess. Buy-spend-buy-spend-buy-spend…what passes for contemporary American “culture” - and its value system - depends entirely upon consumer spending. It’s the engine that makes our society run. We measure our worth by our net-worth, our success by our financial assets, who we are by what we have. If this recent crisis forces us to do nothing more than examine the structureless underbelly of what we believe, it will have served a useful purpose. Raise your hand if you’ve spent your adult life in the service of a financial lie, presenting a prosperous face to the world, while all the time running as fast as you could to keep up. I know I have. Expensive shoes, jewelry, travel experiences, beauty products. Name brands. Never a dime to my name, little in savings, everything leveraged and borrowed against and perpetually in motion, Peter paying Paul paying Peter. I refinanced my house 3 times in the past 8 years. My current mortgage is now three times what my house’s original asking price was. I am not a stupid person. My IQ is 130. The New York Times is delivered to my door daily. I re-read War & Peace, just for fun, ha ha. But wait a second…if I’m so smart, then how come I’m so poor? And didn’t I KNOW better than to get sucked into the machine? Didn’t I read Thoreau and Emerson in college? Didn’t I swear I’d never adopt the shallow materialist values of my parents? Didn’t I have IDEALS? Didn’t me and my friends who grew up in the sixties utterly reject the whole shallow consumerist paradigm?

The truth is that none of us have escaped it. I doubt anyone in this culture CAN escape it. It’s too pervasive. We can no longer even string together our thoughts in non-economic terms. We are “consumers”. We are “products”, products of our culture and products of our times, flipping through magazines, surfing 150 channels, defining ourselves by the aptly-named “goods” that we buy and the purchases that we make, our $1500 handbags, our $900 shoes, our adjustable rate mortgages. We live it, we breathe it, we dream it. We are it.

Well, now the alarm clock has gone off. And unpleasant shock that it’s been, it feels good to finally be awake again. There’s something bracing about finally facing reality. It’s like I always knew this was going to happen, that my past “success” was a triumph of smoke and mirrors and empty values, that it would all come to an end one day, but now that it has, oddly I don’t feel all that bad about it. I’m still here. So are you. No fear, no regrets. Now move on.

Come and Be Inspired

2009-09-27T15:04:00.012-04:00

If you have never had the pleasure of an afternoon spent at Blithewold Mansion on Bristol Harbor, you are really missing one of the loveliest places on earth.

Brown University graduate Augustus Van Winckle (there are Van Winckle gates at Brown and Princeton!) built the original mansion for his wife, Bessie. He had apparently given her a 72’ Herreshoff yacht earlier and she needed a place to moor the boat!

The mansion (actually the first one burned down and the one standing today was rebuilt in 1907) is set on 32 acres of westerly-facing waterfront on Bristol Harbor. It is built in the style of a 17th century manor house. The house is filled with beautiful antiques from all over the world. The oldest pieces are oak and leather armchairs dating back to the early 1600s. There are several beautiful Tiffany lamps. Every room but two still has the original wallpaper and all the furnishings are as the original owner, Bessie, had arranged them. This has been verified through photographs.

The third floor of the mansion is filled with personal diaries, garden plans, family letters and correspondence of all kinds. It is a wonderful glimpse into the past.

Set on 32 acres, to say the gardens are inspiring is an understatement. There are 50 varieties of specimen trees including the largest Sequoia east of the Rockies – right in our backyard. The original greenhouse was restored a few years ago and it is magnificent.

The website for Blithewold is wonderful – they will tell you of all the upcoming events including teas, concerts, and garden workshops. I especially love their garden blog.

Keeping a Journal

2009-09-18T11:00:00.011-04:00

One of my favorite things to give as a gift is a journal. A book of blank pages for my friends and family to fill up with their handwriting, drawings and anything that makes up the moments of their lives.

I’ve got these beautiful, linen napkins and embroidered on them in gold thread is ‘Consider the empty plate, full of possibilities” – the same can be said for the empty page. As soon as you scribble on it in your own hand, it is transformed and can become anything.

My son keeps his music journal. I have several – one is all about my house, I have one for my art work and ideas, one for my garden and one for writing about the days of my life.

In a paper journal, you can scribble things out, add illustrations, ticket stubs, and dried flowers – all clichés but there is a reason some things become iconographic. They are universal mementos and they have the same effect on all of us.

There are a lot of people who use the web as a personal journal but certainly I am not one of them. They record intimate details of their lives and post it on the web for all the world to see.

I still like the feel and look of the handwritten page. It gets messy and wrinkled up but it seems more real and more connected to real life than anything to do with a blog. I like it because it is personal – no right or wrong, it just is.

I do admire the people who use the web to keep their personal journals but I cannot see myself joining them anytime soon.

2009 Six Meter International World Cup - Sailing Now in Newport

2009-09-12T10:05:00.016-04:00

SAILING now in Newport, the 2009 Six Meter International World Cup.

Among my top 10 reasons to live in Newport - this is one. Not in order, but by discovery.
I discovered this event as I drove along Ocean Avenue, I passed several beautiful sailboats - all of the same size - 6 meters, sailing around Brenton Reef, at the entrance to the channel of Narragansett Bay, between Beavertail and Castle Hill. The boats were just cruising at the time, some heading up the bay and some heading out, they are spectacular.

The daily ebb and flow of living on the coast is familiar, the fishing boats and pleasure boats arriving and departing, the QE2 and tankers, and then it suddenly changes, there is an explosion of sails.... and it unfurls without having been part of it, or aware of the planning and coordinating, it happens on another level, on another playing field.....a waterworld, a sailing playground for those fortunate enough to be aboard and involved.

For anyone who wishes to be a part of this sailing world in Newport get involved at Sail Newport!

For the armchair sailors among us, here are the official Day 1 and Day 2 race reports:

Day 2 Race Report2009 Newport 6mR World Cup1900hrsNEWPORT, RI (Sept. 9, 2009) - Today's weather tested the metal (and wood) of competitors in the second day of racing of the 2009 Newport 6mR World Cup.
The northerly brought wind speeds averaging 18-22 knots with gusts of up to 25 knots toward the late afternoon. After a short postponement to allow the ebbing current to settle the rough sea state, a 6 nm course was set northwest of Gould Island.
In the Modern Division it was Scoundrel's (GBR-96) day, skippered by Rob Gray who said, "We had a great start, we only tacked three times and gybed twice for the entire race. Lots of extra maneuvers bring mistakes, which we wanted to avoid today."
Tuesday's winner, Sophie II (SWE-132) helmed by Hugo Stenbeck took second with Patric Fredell's May BE XIV (SWE-114) finishing third. After two days of racing Scoundrel and Sophie II are tied in first place with 3 points, followed by May Be XIV with 9 points and Finnegan (US-123) and Arunga (US-118) with 10 points each.
Owing to magnificent boat handling on the challenging final downwind leg with a building breeze Gallant (KC-10) skippered by Eric Jespersen won the Classic Division. Postle and Pope's Titia (GBR-22) took second place with TP Kolijonen-Astrand's Fridolin (FIN-12) coming in third today. Today's win places Gallant first overall in the division with 4 points; Totem (US-51), Goose (US-81) and Saskia II (KC-19) share a three-way tie for second with 9 points each. The strong northerly breeze is forecast to continue for tomorrow's races.

Day 1 Race Report2009 Newport 6mR World Cup1900hrsNEWPORT, RI (Sept. 9, 2009) - The 6 Metres got off to a slow start today on the first day of the 2009 Six Metre International World Cup. The initial race was abandoned after a northerly breeze died out. By mid-afternoon, however, a light southerly breeze filled in and enabled the Classic and Modern classes to complete their first race of the five-day series. A fleet of approximately 30 spectator and support boats were on hand to watch the thirty-four yachts from 11 countries sail the windward/leeward course. The Modern and Classic Classes had separate starts. In the Modern Division Sophie II (SWE-132) skippered by Hugo Stenbeck won the race by picking off Scoundrel (GBR-96) helmed by Rob Gray at the finish. Andy Parker’s Finnegan (US-123) took third in the only race of the day.
In the Classic Division, relative sailing newcomer, Jesse Smith of Jamestown, RI took first place in his first World Cup competition sailing with his local crew onboard Totem (US-51). It was a good day for the North Americans as second place went to Peter Hofmann’s Goose (US-81) and Gallant (KC-10), helmed by Eric Jespersen took third. Heavier breeze will be welcomed tomorrow, as competitors who have traveled and brought boats from three other continents, chomp for more races. The Race Commmittee will decide early whether to send the fleet to the alternate course North of Newport Bridge to keep the fleet racing inside Narragansett Bay.

PHOTOS courtesty of Onne Van Der Wal

Stormy Day

2009-09-11T12:57:00.005-04:00

It is a stormy day and I was just coming back from showing a darling cottage on Maple Ave in Sand Hill Cove. As I am driving by Scarborough Beach I see that the sky is full of big beautiful kites.

The surf is way up and I couldn’t help but pull over to watch the ocean full of ‘kite boarders’. Wow, this is beautiful. The ocean is rough and the kite boarders are loving it. What a magnificent site. The kites are all different colors, red, and turquoise, green, black…and the kite boarders look like they are dancing over the sea, gracefully playing with the waves, fearlessly speeding across the ocean top.

Wow….there are so many of them. They must be shooting a commercial,
I think. But no…. no commercial. It’s just Rhode Island – and surf’s up.
Pretty cool!

Morning Glory in Wickford

2009-09-10T16:28:00.006-04:00

One of the loveliest things to do in the morning is take a Yoga class in the Studio at Wickford Cove.

This charming and light-filled yoga studio is located right on Wickford Harbor in the waterfront room of the little shop, The Herb Wyfe.

Teachers Belle, Linda, Gail, Diane, and Christine offer classes for beginners to advanced. One recent morning I was the only one who showed up and I had a private class with Belle. What luxury! This is Belle – she is a wonderful instructor.

You really could easily miss this studio as hidden and tucked away as it is. It is really sweet and perfect. The sun shining off the water reflects the most beautiful patterns on the ceiling.

After the class, stay awhile and enjoy a cup of chai. You’ll feel a little calmer, think a little more clearly and be just a little bit happier. Can you ask for anything more?

The Wallpaper Chronicles

2009-09-05T11:37:00.008-04:00

Wallpaper. As a child, I hated it. I hated the repetitiveness of the patterns, the way your eye would go round and round a room and always come to rest on the same exact thing. There was something disturbing about it, disturbing in a way I didn’t yet know how to put words to, an inherent uneasiness that hinted at larger uneasinesses as yet unexpressed. A wallpapered room was a room wearing a mask, creepy, claustrophobic, a room aiming to conceal something. However, my mother loved wallpaper, loved the crisp regularity of it, and she believed it to be an essential visual component of every well ordered home. In our house, wallpaper went up and down with the seasons. The routine never varied. First every last adhering molecule of the old paper had to be removed. By hand, with a pan of solvent, a paint scraper, and when we were old enough, by me and my sister. We might have enjoyed the geometric satisfactions of putting it up, but taking it down? Talk about despising a chore! The wet solvent dripping down your arm…the sickening gluey smell of the sodden paper…the wobbly ladder and its sudden, heart-stopping lurches…the stubborn, welded-on shreds that refused to give it up...and above all, the slow, frustrating stupidity of the paint scraper. God help you if you got the dull one.

So needless to say, as an adult, wallpaper is not a place I’ve ever cared to go.

And yet…and yet. There’s a nostalgia factor to old wallpaper that can’t be denied. Almost nothing evokes the reality of a vanished past more effectively than traces of old wallpaper clinging to a wall; the very fact of its decrepitude serves as poignant reminder that it was once fresh and new, applied with hope and good intentions, tempus fugit. These remnants out of time are windows into other lives, other minds, other experiences.

I ask you: Who in the world would opt to surround themselves with Leonardo’s “Last Supper” endlessly repeating like a stuck record, pieces of which to this day still adhere to the basement walls of a small, otherwise unremarkable white house on Broadway? Who would want to live with the rigors of a biblical toile pattern, featuring a stern patriarchal figure (Moses? Abraham?) vingnetted over & over, as seen in the attic of 17 Third Street? What would it have been like to sleep in a room like that every night, stamped as it was to infinity with themes of guilt and redemption? Did those messages seep into one’s very soul? Who plastered the planks of the attic walls at 17 Chestnut with discarded newspapers & handbills from the late 18th century? Décor - or insulation - or both? Was the sailboat pattern on the closet ceiling of that dilapidated cottage on Kerry Hill chosen by an indifferent workman or by an energetic young mother-to-be? What vanished romance inspired that floral pattern in the bedroom?

Once you start noticing it, the wallpaper evidence is everywhere, and can be found in just about every old house in Newport. Look at it; look closely. Newport is good at keeping its history everpresent. Let yourself examine these gorgeous shards of vernacular history, and the ghosts who are responsible for them will flame back into being for a split second - if only in your imagination - before vanishing back into the unfathomability of the past.

A Captivating Lifestyle

2009-09-01T15:00:00.000-04:00

One of the liveliest and most recent art groups to form is the Sakonnet Arts Network.

They have a great website and on it you can find all sorts of interesting events and classes for the artist and for the arts patron.

You can participate in Plein Aire painting – I have seen small groups of local artists set up along the Sakonnet and I always want to join them. You can enroll in evening figure workshops, learn how to make paper incorporating flower petals (love that!), meet for Dancing with Sculpture in Little Compton (sounds intriguing)
or maybe drop in for a pilates or belly dancing class with Barbara, the Dancing Spirit (that’s her studio on Main Road near Coastal Roasters – you have to check it out).

South Tiverton is a short ride from Newport and has so much to offer. Whenever I stop in at the town hall, I linger over the current art exhibit. There is always some new and delightful art to look at on the walls of the meeting room.

Congratulations to Tiverton for being such a lively and artistic locale – when you combine that with all the conservation land and open space, it really is a great choice if you are looking for a new place to live.

Call us – we can show you many beautiful homes in Tiverton.

Christie's Great Estates Newsletter - Issue 3 2009

2009-08-28T11:51:00.003-04:00

In this issue:

Frank Lloyd Wright's Ennis House offered at $15 Million
Villa Mabrouka: Yves Saint Laurent's Home in Tangier, Morocco
Great Destinations: El Puertito Boating Village in Uruguay
The Annenberg Diamond
Significant Sales (Wrentham House sold by Lila Delman Real Estate)
Rising Home Prices Make Headlines

Issue3_2009_web.pdf

Jazz on a Summer's Day

2009-07-18T15:58:00.017-04:00

A familiar past.

Just as the sounds you hear are the familiar sounds of jazz at its most classic (that are in no way outdated), so too are the familiar images of Newport at its most classic: the waterfront skyline, with its steeples and colonial houses, vintage vehicles on parade, and seagoing yachts racing on sunlit waters.

Some things have changed, we no longer get here by ferry, and we no longer dress for a jazz festival as if attending Ascot---but the spirit has remained remakably intact.

Revisit the early days of the Newport Jazz Festival, Jazz On A Summer's Day.

Sit back, marinate some ice cubes and let Louis Armstrong surround you with Up The Lazy River or take Tea for Two with Anita O'Day and enjoy the day.

Sensational America's Cup sailing footage accompanied by Thelonius Monk.

Jazz on a Summer's Day (1960) is a remarkable documentary set at the 1958 Newport Jazz Festival in Rhode Island, and filmed and directed by noted commercial and fashion photographer Bert Stern.

It's so relaxing, so cool, so Newport.

Planning Ahead

2009-07-15T13:37:00.005-04:00

It is such a great time to buy a home – low interest rates, plenty of inventory, time to get settled in before the kids start school, just to name a few reasons. I have been working with a lot of buyers lately and had a few thoughts about the process. Having been through this many times with wonderful buyers and their families, I thought I would write down a few of my thoughts on the subject that will make things a little easier on you, the buyer.

First – Select your location. This can be very general or very specific. I suggest that you don’t start looking at the insides of houses until you decide what locale you prefer. It could be a town, or specific part of town, or maybe you like 2 or 3 towns. But try to narrow it down or you will get tired and frustrated doing something that should be enjoyable and fun. Take a few rides with your family and get to know the different towns and villages first. It will pay off in the long run. There is no sense finding the ideal home in a part of town you just can’t abide. You can change a house with remodeling, but you cannot change the location. Do you like the sea, the woods, are you concerned about the school system, do you like to walk to shops and neighbors or do you like deep solitude?

Second – Decide what kind of house you like. This does not have to be a specific style, but more importantly, it is about how you and your family live in the space. How many public rooms do you need to be comfortable? How many bedrooms and baths? Garage space? Do you really need a basement or will it become a storage unit for unwanted possessions? Do you like walk-up attics? Big yards or small? Open floor plans or lots of small rooms or a combination of both? Do you need a guest suite?

Third – Fill in the details. After you have the location narrowed down and have an idea of what kind of living space you like you can fill in the list with details like fireplace, hardwood floors, granite counters, patios, sheds, big windows……in other words, details. You may or may not get all of them in one house but these details are something that can be added later if not currently in an otherwise perfect house.

Fourth – have fun and remember that buying a house is not an event – it’s a process. I hope to see you during your house-hunting adventure.

class war at 40 Broadway

2009-06-18T17:25:00.004-04:00

Last week a preservationist friend gave me a big blue button that says “Newport Needs Its Past”. Evidently someone was giving them out at a recent city council hearing on whether or not Newport should hire a new historic preservation officer to replace the one who vacated the post last fall. You’d think that filling the post ASAP would be pretty much of a no-brainer for a town whose economic lifeblood is historic tourism & whose future fortunes are almost entirely dependant on the success of that industry, but alas the world is not always a rational place, and numerous and vocal are the objectors to this plan. Their arguments run along the usual predictable lines. Can’t afford it. Don’t need it. Too much government interference in private life. No one’s going to tell ME whether I can replace a window, etc. Like so much else in life, increasingly (to me at least) these arguments seem to be less about the ostensible subject under discussion – i.e. the filling of the vacant position – than a thinly disguised battle over other issues, in this case between the economic interests of blue vs white collar Newport, the people with the chain link fences pitted against the people with the wrought iron fences. Both sides believe that they should get the final say on how things look around here. And it strikes me – committed preservationist that I am – that the opposing side does indeed inadvertently raise some very uncomfortable theoretical questions for us vis-à-vis our “Newport Needs Its Past” campaign: Who’s past are we preserving? And whose past are we erasing in the interests of saving whatever it is we deem worth saving?

I think you could make the argument that Newport is as architecturally rich as it is precisely because every period was allowed to express itself, because new things were built on top of old things, existing buildings were repurposed, utilitarian and cosmetic fixes were patched in willy-nilly with little regard for aesthetics and controls…which of course resulted in exactly the kind of organic aesthetic that the Wrought Iron Fence People now want to protect. But ironically, it was precisely the Chain Link Fence Person mentality that brought this aesthetic into being – the patch it up, make it do, make it work, piece it together approach favored everywhere by the working poor, for the simple reason that they can’t afford to adopt any other. For every William Vanderbilt that summered in Newport, there were fifty Irish maids who made his life possible. For every John LaFarge or William James who lived and worked here there were a hundred illiterate fishermen who’d never heard of them. From 1639 on, every cultured illustrious Newport inhabitant has been shadowed by a crowd of thousands of working class nobodies. Slaves. Servants. Fishermen. Seamstresses. Grocers. Carters. People who lived in small cheap houses in poor neighborhoods and saved pieces of string & old newspapers and never gave a thought to the aesthetics of architecture or the picturesque, because they would have been luxuries so out of reach & impractical that they weren’t even understood to be options. Chain Link Fence People everywhere, of every era, usually find survival more to their taste than aesthetics.

All of which brings me back to paradox of the button again. Yes, Virginia, Newport Needs Its Past. Newport needs preservation. But let’s not be stupid or naïvely idealistic about it. Let’s not pretend our commitment to preservation isn’t preventing other social truths from being expressed. Let’s not pretend that a lot of class conflicts don’t lie at the heart of this debate. And let’s not stop asking ourselves how true to reality – to any reality, of any period – is a preserved Newport, and if a preserved Newport is even an authentic one?

The Kindness of Strangers

2009-06-09T14:55:00.005-04:00

Where I live there are two beaches. One is accessed through two little footpaths and the other has a small, gravel resident parking lot and boat launch.

The area is filled with wild sweet peas and beach roses. The neighbors have set out big pots along the lot edge and planted geraniums, too.

Some people who know the area like to take a detour off Scenic 1-A and drive along Seaview Avenue to take in the view. It is a slightly sloping hill right down to the sea. If you love the bay, it is pretty impressive – you can see from Portsmouth to Jamestown. We also get birders who sit by the roadside with binoculars to watch the herons and egrets.

Recently, my neighbor was plating geraniums in the lot and a woman drove by for a look at the bay. She made a comment about the flowers and my neighbor said that she wished she had more because the few she had did not deter boaters from dropping trash into the flower pots. (I know, hard to believe, but some people are really thoughtless – even boaters) That was it and the woman drove off.

A little while later, the woman returned with a couple of dozen geranium plants! They were donated by Wickford Flowers. It turned out she works there. We don’t know her name but we thank her and Wickford Flowers very much. What a nice thing to do!

Lila's Movies - Daybreak

2009-06-03T09:25:00.000-04:00

Beautiful waterfront property in Jamestown, Rhode Island.

Coastal Living Newport Regatta

2009-06-02T16:35:00.002-04:00

Lila Delman Real Estate is proud to be an official partner of the 2009 Coastal Living Newport Regatta, July 11-12.
For more information and to purchase tickets to the weekend of events, please visit www.coastalliving.com/regatta

A Wonderful Place In A Calming Location

2009-05-29T12:06:00.014-04:00

A real center of the community in Wickford is the library.

The statistics say it is one of the busiest in the state and from what I can see, that is very true.

I’m there at least 2 or 3 times a week and the place is always a beehive of activity. Patrons range from toddlers to seniors and everyone seems to be enjoying themselves.

Not only do they have any book, movie or music CD you could desire but they have so many wonderful programs and activities for all ages. Art exhibits, French practice, music performances, guest speakers, knitting for kids, walking tours through Wickford by local historian Tim Cranston, poetry reading and discussion and book discussion groups. There is also internet access and a quiet study room.

The setting is wonderful, relaxing and contemplative. Waterfront on Academy Cove, you can sit in the meditation garden or walk down to the footbridge to see what the ducks are up to. I’m sure your local library is just as wonderful (I also LOVE Narragansett Library) but if you would like to explore a bit, try Wickford. Then you can go into town and have a sandwich and do some shopping.

Happy Birthday, Lina

2009-05-22T14:36:00.009-04:00

I wanted to wish someone very special an Extra Happy Birthday. It is not everyday that you turn 8 years old.

This is an extraordinary child. She is so great at finding sea ice that she discovered an entire little beach on Wild Goose Point and we are always sure to add to our collection whenever we can. We like to keep it around the house – inside and out. It must be those big, blue eyes.

She also is very, very good at taking care of little dogs. She makes them feel safe, loved and comfy in their little beds. I don’t know what I would do without her help sometimes.

When Halloween rolls around, Lina is sure to come up with a great costume. She usually has 2 or 3 different looks up her sleeve and we never know until the big night which look she will choose. This past year she was an unbelievably convincing Senorita. Don’t you agree?

Lina has an artistic nature and she loves arts and crafts. Who else (besides Mia!) could make a huge, walking puppet of a dwarf hamster (named Daisy) out of an oversized leaf bag? She is also on the cutting edge of sidewalk art. She has a knack.

She is a great soccer player, swimmer, gymnast, fantastic reader and an all around excellent student. She is very hard to beat when we play the memory game. We have 2 – one is of old fashioned French tools and the other is of toys. You would think it is easy but believe me, it is not. She always beats me fair and square.

But most of all, she is my darling and I want to wish her an Extra Happy Birthday!

Captivating the Heir Apparent

2009-05-18T11:38:00.008-04:00

There are certain houses that seem to attract just the right buyers. They started out their lives looking beautiful and somehow have remained so and even grown more lovely. They may have been around for a long time and no one has ruined them with well-intentioned but bad remodels.

While I do not know the entire history of this house but hope to find out more, I do know that the past 4 owners have included 2 architects, 1 interior designer and 1 landscape architect. Pretty impressive if you are looking for a house with a pedigree of good taste. It definitely shows with this house where less is more.

The landscape mastermind for these 2.7 acres was a professor at Harvard and designed the land to be beautiful but trouble-free. Very low maintenance. And the man who mows the lawn has been doing so for the past 25 or 30 years. He knows every square inch of the parcel which includes an in ground pool surrounded by hydrangeas and sea grass and fenced garden beds for growing vegetables. There is even room for a proper clothesline.

It is adjacent to South Kingstown Land Trust land and is waterfront on Perch Cove which opens up into Potter Pond - which means there are some wonderful opportunities for bird watching and enjoying the beauty of nature. It is also in the vicinity of Trustom Pond National Wildlife Refuge (640 acres), Matunuck Management Area (145 acres), Moonstone Beach and more pristine spots conserved for us to enjoy.

I have no doubt that the next owner of this beautiful house will appreciate it for what it is and will bless the day they found this treasure.

Six degrees of separation

2009-05-05T15:06:00.005-04:00

By now most of us are familiar with the “six degrees of separation” concept, the notion that everyone on the planet is pretty much related somehow. You know…Barrack Obama turns out to be related to Thomas Jefferson, George Bush and Vladamir Putin are actually distant cousins, the person sitting at the next desk is descended from the Romonovs, etc. Well something kind of strange happened recently – call it an amazing coincidence of sorts – that started me thinking. What about the six degrees of separation between buildings?

This is what happened. I had a client who was purchasing a house at 28 Channing Street. Right about the same time I got a new listing for a house at 18 Congdon Ave. The two houses are in the same neighborhood, two or three blocks apart, and my buyer actually looked at both houses. So far so good. He put in an offer on the Channing St house, and to his delight, it was accepted. Meanwhile, to my delight, my listing at 18 Congdon was also put under contract. Even better. But this is where it starts to get spooky. My buyer, in his excitement about buying the house on Channing, went over to City Hall and did some research on the property, going all the way back to the moment it was built. And what he found was this: that the person who had built 28 Channing had done so while living at 18 Congdon. The two houses had a six degrees of separation type link and we – my buyer, my seller, and me - were the connective tissue.

Fast forward to later the same week. I was trying to find some background info on Moorland Lodge and kept running into a blank wall. Then I came across an entry for it on the National Register District website, claiming that it had been built by Vera Scott Cushman, heiress to the Chicago department store fortune of Carson Pirie Scott. Now the Carson Pirie Scott building in Chicago is one of THE most famous buildings in the history of American architecture, designed by Louis Sullivan, one of the very first skyscrapers, one of the very first buildings to ever employ a curtain wall, etc. It’s totally landmark, ultra famous with the scholarly set. And then it occurred to me – there was a six degrees of separation thing between the CPS building and Moorland Lodge! They’re relatives – once via Vera Cushman, and once again via me noticing the link. It was incredible. Believing I’d possibly stumbled upon one of the greatest secrets of life ever, I became more and more convinced that there might be an invisible network of relationships connecting seemingly disparate buildings. Could it actually be that a system of secret architectural energetics mysteriously underlay the everyday visible world? If true, I was so THERE…

So I started looking for these connections everywhere. And finding them. I didn’t even have to leave Vera Scott Cushman and Moorland Lodge far behind; it turns out that Cushman went on to live at Avalon out on the Drive, which in turn became the Van Alen estate, which in turn is what swallowed up Wrentham House and put it under a spell for decades…which means that Moorland Lodge & Wrentham House are sort of like distant long-lost cousins, reunited by their present day Lila Delman-client status. Or how about Berry Hill, next door to Moorland Lodge? Prior to being Moorland Lodge, a structure belonging to the Berry Hill estate stood in that location, although whether the earlier building was demolished to make way for Moorland Lodge, or was just radically rebuilt & enlarged is an open question. But either way, it would seem there’s a family connection of sorts.

Postscript. I’d finished writing this blog, but hadn’t yet pulled the photos so I could publish it, when I came across an old 2007 issue of Food & Wine magazine a few weeks ago. It had been floating around the back of my car ever since, and the other evening I finally got around to bringing it inside. I set it down on my kitchen table and casually glanced down at the label on the cover, and what I saw froze my blood. It was addressed to an occupant at 17 Chestnut Street, a house I had just listed two days before.

I rest my case.