When I was a callow youth, more familiar with monster movies and comic books than with cliches, I found a note from my mother saying something like, “I’ve left some snacks out for the time being, but I’ll be back later to fix dinner.” There was really nothing odd about the note, but my overactive imagination swung into gear. The…
Every spring I watched with a mixture of admiration and envy as my neighbors’ yards transmuted from snow-covered mud flats into stunning gardens. By summer, our quiet little street looked like a horticultural block party, a festival of color. Until you reached my yard, that is. A yard filled with islands of brown dirt and stubby clumps of yellowing grass,…
James Rundlet was a precise man, someone who carefully laid out the plans for his Portsmouth home and gardens using his considerable knowledge of geometry and trigonometry. Two hundred years later, the results are still pleasing. He started life as a farmer’s son, but soon amassed a fortune as a merchant and investor. When Rundlet built his Federal-style house in…
Seven years ago, Lisa Muskat and her husband fell in love with a farmhouse in Bedford that was built two centuries ago. But love affairs inevitably have challenges and so did this one. Most of the house had to be gutted to, as Lisa says, “get to the bones” and bring the house up to today’s standards. The majority of…
More to Love In the April issue, one of the letters suggested a future article about the use of stone. I concur with the writer’s solid suggestion. On a recent visit home to the Granite State, I came across the stone wall depicted in this photo (below). Obviously, this is the work of a modern stone mason. This wall is…
