Tag: Druid Hills

The Historic Druid Hills house is one of several Atlanta homes designed by one of Georgia’s first female architects, Leila Ross Wilburn. During Deana Kingsbury's ownership, the house was extensively renovated to suit a 21st-century family, but its history wasn’t forgotten in the process.

Coming from smaller towns, physicians Sharon Castellino and Renato Santos weren’t sure they wanted to live in a big city, until jobs with Emory School of Medicine brought them to Atlanta. Fortunately, their quiet neighborhood, equidistant from the university, Druid Hills, and Decatur, gives them the walkability of intown life with plenty of greenspace and trees.

Historic architecture and transitional interiors can be an exciting pair, bringing new energy to old bones. Case in point: this 1920s Druid Hills house, where the design-build team at HammerSmith created a comfortable, livable family home—with some modern surprises thrown in for fun.

“I love a big, white, brick house,” says Vivian Bencich, who founded architecture and interior design firm Square Feet Studio with her husband.

In 1990, Clark Ashton quit his day job as an electronic technician to devote his life to building a metal-art museum in the front and back yards of his Decatur home. The Augusta native dubbed it the Mechanical Riverfront Kingdom on Druid Hill.

It’s no secret that midcentury-modern furniture is back in vogue. But now, the era’s ranch-style and split-level homes are selling better than ever, according to Vanessa Reilly of Atlanta boutique real estate firm DOMO Realty. Although midcentury modern homes can be found throughout Atlanta, she notes that the majority are close to I-285, with the highest concentrations in the neighborhoods of Amberwood, Collier Heights, Northcrest, and Northwoods.

The Druid Hills house where interior designer Susan Ferrier lives with her husband, Adrian, was described in her new book as a “portrait of an artist and a bit of a sorceress’s cave.”

It was on nightly walk around their Druid Hills neighborhood in 2003 when David and Michele Wilson noticed a ‘for sale’ sign at 850 Oakdale Road. They had long admired the stately home, which was designed by revered Atlanta architect Neel Reid and built in 1915.

Atlanta may be quick to tear down historic public buildings, but the metro area is full of lovely old residential neighborhoods.

Since metro Atlanta’s recovery began in earnest in 2012, prices are up—in some places way up. Here, how the median home value has changed from December 2011 to December 2015.