As featured in The New York Times, May 2012. (Just google 'Hurry If You Want a Pool'!)
TWELVE WEEK MINIMUM RENTAL. SUMMER 2014 IS AVAILABLE. Hurry if you want a pool!
Built in 1790, this sweet, lovingly-restored 'eyebrow' Colonial combines period charm with modern comfort and technology. Two working fireplaces, central A/C in the main house, heated low-chlorine saltwater pool, WiFi broadband, Hi-Def cable TVs, frog pond. The wood furnishings are all New England antiques, while the upholstered furniture is new -- welcoming, comfortable and very very clean. The perfect weekend home.
We're situated on 20 hilly wooded acres in the serene and verdant Northwest Corner of Litchfield County.
Pastoral beauty is everywhere, as are great restaurants, bookshops and antique shops. The Appalachian Trail skims the distant back of the property, and canoeing on the stunning Housatonic River is but a few minutes away. 2 hours from Times Square, 45 minutes to Tanglewood. Glorious autumn foliage, languid summers, and lovely deep snows in winter.
Area residents include Meryl Streep, Michael J. Fox, Henry Kissinger, Kevin Bacon (so just the 1 degree, then!).
The Area Around Our House: Nearby Rte 4 (a state-designed Scenic Road) meanders through some of New England's loveliest scenery, picking up picturesque towns and villages along the way. Besides the Audubon Society and Ellsworth Farm, right here in Sharon, you have the fine restaurants, bookshops, antique shops and gourmet food shops of nearby Kent to the south of us, and Lakeville and Salisbury to the north. Hike the nearby Appalachian Trail which skims the distant edge of our woods, or the pretty Mohawk Trail, which is just a few miles away. The famed Sharon Playhouse still puts on its summer musicals, and all the cultural amenities of the Berkshires thrive in a sophisticated, upscale, and gay friendly environment. Half an hour from the house is the charming Millerton Moviehouse, a mom & pop cinema with a nice cafe, showing first-run films in tiny, tidy rooms. Kent boasts, besides numerous art galleries, the nationally-famous Belgique chocolate shop run by a former White House chef. (Try their amazing Speculoos chocolates!)
The Seasons: Summer here is superb, of course, but this being classic New England, every season has its own extraordinary features. Some of the best fall foliage in the region is all around our house and town. (People frequently stop to take photos of our own exceptionally-pretty foliage from the street.) The occasional snowfalls can be deep and romantic, and spring is -- well, spring! Our hillside is dotted with hundreds of daffodils, followed by forsythia and then lilacs. Superb!
In spring (and after any heavy rain), make a point of crossing the ancient local covered bridges to see the waters cascading through heaps of boulders (Bulls Bridge, at the bottom end of Kent on Route 7) or to see the rapids swirling (West Cornwall, ten minutes north of us on Route 7). And of course, there's the beautiful Kent Falls, again on Route 7, just north of Kent.
History of the House: The property first appears in area maps as part of the pre-Revolutionary Studley wagon-wheel works, which made much use of our little pond and its then-robust feeder stream. The faint vestiges of wagon tracks crossing through our hillsides were for the transport of Studley's home-made charcoal from the hilltops down to their blacksmith's furnace by the pond. The town's surviving English property records, dating from the 1750's, show that the first recorded owner of the property was known as, quite simply, 'the Frenchman'. You will note that many panes of glass in the windows of the oldest section of the house are true antiques -- filled with the bubbles and ripples that were the result of primitive early manufacturing techniques. it's an effect that is extremely expensive to duplicate today, and the life it gives to the living and dining rooms is really lovely. Look for Clinton Wilcox's elegant signature, scribed into one of the panes with a diamond ring.
PLEASE NOTE THAT OUR MINIMUM RENTAL IS TWELVE WEEKS. NOW BOOKING SUMMER 2013 !!!
