Main Street.
The very term conjures up images of Americana, of history, tradition and Norman Rockwell paintings. Are there many towns that don`t have a Main Street, where people once gathered and the village`s business was conducted?
Downers Grove surely does, not just in name, but in ambience, too.
This home, at 4104 Main St., is between Good Samaritan Hospital and Ogden Avenue, and the listing agent calls this busy, four-lane street location a plus.
”Downers Grove is strong in tradition,” said broker Nancy Schultz of Century 21`s Clark and Holm in Downers Grove. ”It has a family-oriented lifestyle. The history of the road was as a main trade center and artery for travel. I live in Downers and, to me, this location is desirable.”
The 66-year-old Tudor home, listed at $190,000, nicely blends a feel for history with, as Schultz called it, ”the luxury and appointment of today`s homes.”
The 17-by-12 living room shows tradition with its crown molding and recessed shelves, arched at the top in typical Tudor styling. The entry closet is large, offering racks, pegs, shelves and a leaded-glass window. The fireplace has glass doors and wide wood mantel.
The room displays modernization with brand-new, neutral-toned carpeting, refinished and weather-stripped windows, and both recessed and track lighting. The dining room has a bay window and walls that are paneled below the chair rail. It opens into both the kitchen and a lovely screened-in porch.
”It reminds me of going to my grandmother`s house,” Schultz said of the walk into the porch, which has a western exposure. ”I`m really falling in love with this house; you could decorate it in Victorian styling, or it could be very country, or you could use white decorating and sculptures for an elegant look.”
The kitchen has been partially updated, but it is the one room most in need of more modernization. A parquet counter and greenhouse window are overshadowed by the harvest gold stove and refrigerator and matching sink.
While the kitchen is small, at 12 by 9 feet, there`s plenty of pantry space a step away on the porch, and a few steps away in the breakfast room.
Schultz calls the breakfast room a sun room and notes how it also could serve as an office or playroom. Whatever you call it, this is a lovely 12-by-9 area, with wood-plank walls brightened by a whole-wall bay window. The sunroom has doors to the kitchen and screened porch. There`s also a first-floor powder room.
Upstairs, the three bedrooms are large, with the smallest at 12 by 15 feet.
A second, 23-by-10 bedroom and the 20-by-12 master bedroom boast bounteous and unusual closet arrangements: a double-wide closet with organizers and a variety of poles right next to another, single closet.
The master bedroom has a bathroom with a shower enclosure and a sink in the bedroom itself.
The large main bathroom upstairs shows the most modernization, including a whirlpool, heat lamp and skylight. It`s a sharp contrast to a long-defunct coal chute inside a step-up coal room in the basement.
A charming blend of old and new-that`s the Main idea.
