If you gut a house and make it modern is it still "historic"?

Today's Washington Post Magazine features a story, "A Marriage of Styles," on the "renovation" of a historic rowhouse.

Looking at the various interior photos, much of the architectural detail dating to the original construction was ripped out other than some doors and windows.

When I first became interested in preservation, I was mostly interested in facades.

The rowhouse I lived in had been pretty much stripped of original detail long before, and given that I was not trained in planning or preservation at the time, I didn't think much about it.

Small rowhouses on Wylie Street NE, Washington, DC.  Photo by Elise Bernard/Frozen Tropics.

Many years later, after I became more knowledgeable, and when we moved into a simple (not with great Craftsman like details) bungalow in an undesignated neighborhood, but where we were only the third owners of the property, I became much more interested in interior preservation, because much of the original detail was intact -- seafoam green double sideboard kitchen sink, a similarly colored bathtub, a 1930s Magic Chef oven, original wood floors, most of the windows intact, wood trim (although in the "public rooms" most of the trim had long since been painted, but not in the "private rooms" -- the bedrooms and back sitting porch), light fixtures, a couple of skeleton keys in doorlocks, etc.

Before we moved in, we got the Bungalow Bathrooms and Bungalow Kitchens books by Jane Powell because we knew we were going to have to do some renovation, and we wanted what we did to be congruent with the house's architectural style.

And that's what we did, mixing new elements along with the old, including what I call the $2000 sink, because we bought a c. 1950 Crane sink, art deco but it worked, but it had major issues in terms of the faucet fixtures, and required a lot of repair and rebuilding...

I do think that historic preservation is or should be about more than preserving the shell of a building.

Ikea cabinets and shelving.

Yes, a quality renovation was done of the house featured in the Post, but by removing virtually all original details, I would argue that a lot of the house character has been lost.

Even though likely it still is a great place to live, looks more than functional, etc.

I've noticed that most of the Post real estate features on house renovations show something similar to this piece--a gut renovation of a historic house, elimination of interior walls to create an "open plan", etc. and a diminishment of the house's historic character.

I remember for awhile, in the special quarterly real estate section of the Washington Business Journal that Rebecca Miller of DC Preservation League had a column. (Similarly, many years ago, for awhile the Wall Street Journal ran a similar historic preservation feature in their weekend real estate section.)

Modern Vent A Hood installed to match a 1930s Magic Chef oven.

Given the importance of historic architecture, historic urban design, and historicity to the city's competitive advantage, it would be worth trying to get such a column in the weekend Washington Post real estate section. House tours help too, but maybe they are more about "preaching to the converted." (Although based on past experience, plenty of houses on the tours have been modernized, often in oft putting ways.)

Although a number of years ago, I had a conversation with Roger Lewis, author of the twice monthly (?) column "Shaping the City" in the Post real estate section, and he said the editor of the real estate section wasn't much interested in issues of urbanism.

Certainly, editor Marc Fisher has written plenty of anti-historic preservation articles over the years that have been damaging to preservation, as have writings by Matthew Yglesias and economist Edward Glaesar.

Most recently is the "controversy" stirred up by the Greater Greater Washington blog about solar panels on the fronts of historic houses--this has even spilled over into the New York Times ("When Historic Preservation Hurts Cities") although Preservation Maryland had an excellent response ("When Historic Preservation Helps Cities"), which will be the subject of a follow on post.