House of the Week: “Bolingbroke Manor”

Double sets of brick piers flank the driveway off highway 50 to this property and the second set of brick piers flanks black double iron gates with “Bolingbroke Manor”  inscribed in oval plaques on each pier. The driveway soon leaves the highway traffic behind and disappears into the woods with glimpses of water until it turns into a circular drive infilled with planting on axis with the front door of this majestic Georgian house that rests gracefully on its almost 9 acres of land with lawns that slope down to Bolingbroke Creek and to the Choptank River. 

I love classic Georgian architecture for the grace of its proportions and symmetry, hipped roof, brick facades, multi-paned windows, heavily articulated cornice with dentils and details including the elliptical arched transom over the front door with half glass sidelights. What gives this manor house its majesty are the two-story porticoes at both the front and rear facades that are supported by giant Corinthian columns that are the correct diameter for their height. The brick chimneys are bookends to the hipped roof’s ridge and at each side of the main wing, one-story “L” shaped hyphens end in hipped roofs. The scale of the terraces underneath both portico create stunning outdoor rooms framed by vistas of the lawns and water through the column bays.

The floor plan is classic Georgian with a center hall between the four corner rooms of the living room, family room, dining room and kitchen.  The center hall introduces the house’s highest quality of interior décor with the beautiful wood floors, wood wainscot topped with molding, wood door casings with plinth blocks, fluted jambs, and tall cornice; and multi-layered crown molding with dentils.  The light blue walls, crisp white trim, crystal chandelier capped with a medallion, antique furnishings and Oriental rugs create an elegant look.

The front living room and kitchen have pairs of windows at the exterior wall and the rear family room and dining room have bay windows to maximize views of the lawns and water.  The back to back fireplaces between the living and family rooms creates a passage between the rooms and to the door leading though the hyphen’s hall past the primary suite’s bath and closet room next to the primary bedroom. The sumptuous bedroom has double pairs of sliding doors to both the front and rear terraces and side windows flanking the fireplace opposite the large antique bed. 

The family room’s white upholstered furnishings stand out against the pale blue walls and the seating is grouped around the fireplace and TV with the glass top of the coffee table floating above the large Oriental rug. The dining room’s bay window and side window provide water views and the dining room’s built-in cabinet has glass doors for crystal and silver above the top of the wood wainscot and closed cabinet doors below that blends into the wainscot. Between the dining room and the kitchen are a service core of closets and the powder room off the center hall. 

In the custom designed kitchen, cabinetry wraps around the corner of the service core to create a butler’s pantry wall facing the breakfast room. The spacious kitchen is a cook’s dream and continues the blue and white theme with blue walls, white cabinets,  two rows of upper cabinets with molding to the underside of the ceiling, black granite countertops and white backsplash accented with single square tiles inset at chamfered corners of the tile.

The hyphen off the kitchen leads to the breakfast room with a wide cased opening providing a vista to the kitchen’s butler pantry wall.  Wide triple windows offer views of the lawn and water. Front sliding doors lead to a cozy terrace partially enclosed by the manor’s exterior walls.  The remainder of this wing is the laundry, another powder room and the two-car garage. 

The four guest rooms and three full baths are located on the second floor and the bedrooms are arranged at the corners of the floor so there are two walls for windows for each room. There is also a walk up attic for storage. The basement level has an exterior stair up to grade and another family room large enough to accommodate a pool table and separate seating area, a room for exercise and another storage room.

Classic Georgian splendor, exceptional level of detail and craftsmanship, floor plan with easy flow among the rooms, main level sumptuous primary suite, outdoor spaces of front and rear porticoes with flagstone flooring and brick steps, deep water pier with two lifts, private beach, in-ground pool and hot tub-a location on a long private peninsula with 2500 +/- of shoreline along Bolingbroke Creek to the Choptank River, who could ask for anything more? 

For more information about this property, contact Barb Watkins with Benson and Mangold at 410-822-1415 (o), 410-310-2021 (c), or [email protected]. For more photographs and pricing, visit www.easternshorehomes.com,   “Equal Housing Opportunity”.

Photography by Janelle Stroop, Thru the Lens Photography, 845-744- 2758, [email protected] 

Spy House of the Week is an ongoing series that selects a different home each week. The Spy’s Habitat editor Jennifer Martella makes these selections based exclusively on her experience as a architect.

Jennifer Martella has pursued her dual careers in architecture and real estate since she moved to the Eastern Shore in 2004. Her award winning work has ranged from revitalization projects to a collaboration with the Maya Lin Studio for the Children’s Defense Fund’s corporate retreat in her home state of Tennessee.