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---- bd AEE IS. | uid rea 8 -- PORT PERRY STAR -- Tuesday, October 21, 1986 Twolocalhomes snag top awards The Oshawa and District Real Estate Board has confirmed what local folks have known all along-- some of the nicest homes in Durham Region are right here in Port Perry! Two families were recently honoured when the Board chose their homes as award winners in the 1986 Pride ot Ownership contest, part of the festivities surrounding Private Property Week, October 5 to 13. Homes throughout the Oshawa and District Real Estate Board Area were nominated by private in- dividuals for a series of awards, most of which apply to homes or commercial enterprises which endeavour to recapture the flavour of Canadian heritage. In fact, the theme for this year's Private Property Week was "Come honour our Heritage and preserve your property rights.' The rationale behind this theme was if people preserve their Canadian heritage, they also preserve their right to own and enjoy private property. Past winners of the awards have included Tom and Daphne Mitchell, a commercial award for the heritage feel of The Settlement House. This year, Angela and Daniel McPhee of Queen Street were nam- ed winners of the Residential Historical/Wood category for their beautiful blue home near Port Perry High School. . Peter and Nancy Hvidsten of Perry Street were winners in the Non Historic Residential with Tradi- tional Styling category for their new home which looks like it was built more than a hundred years ago. Both are beautiful Victorian style homes, the pride of their owners, and the envy of many of their neighbours. Daniel and Angela McPhee have been deluged with offers to sell their house ever since they purchased it three years ago from Mrs. Whitby, a woman who lived in the house so, long it is still affectionately called 'the Whitby house." But even though they've received some tempting offers, the McPhee's have no inclination to sell their home. They admit they're in love with the house and with the town and are more than content to stay there while they raise their two children, Matthew, 2, and Elizabeth, 5. For the McPhee's and the Whitby house, it was love at first sight. They were living in Little Britain 3 Lad bo Dave Tonkin, chairman of Private Property Week for the Oshawa and District Real Estate Board, poses with award winners Daniel and three years ago when they drove down to Port Perry to buy license plates for their car. The licensing of- fice was closed for lunch, so Daniel and Angela "decided to kill an hour looking around." "We were just driving by the house when we saw real estate agent Valerie Butt putting up a (for sale) sign," Daniel recalls. They stopped, talked to Mrs. Butt for a moment or two, and wound up buying the house. At the time, the house was painted white, which camouflaged the in- tricate gingerbread trim, and it had no driveway. The McPhee's remedied the driveway problem and eventually stained the house a rich blue colour to show off the , Bingerbread. The house was basically sound, "but as Daniel says, 'It was rough. The back porch was on a 45 degree angle." ~ Angela says, 'It was like the house of horrors at the CNE." Since Daniel is a builder by trade, it was no problem for him to straighten up the back porch and fix up the rest of the house, starting from the outside and working in. The interior of the house still isn't finished as far as the McPhee's are Angela McPhee, and their nominator Cliff Crowell of Ridge North Realty in Port Perry. '#, fi nn Si dal Real Estate looks on. Award photos courtesy of their award from Dave Tonkin, while their Oshawa-Whitby this week. nominator Howard Forder of Howard Forder concerned, but they're patient, and are slowly working away at the task, one room at a time. Still, they don't expect the house to be straight as an arrow. It's what they expect from a house 'built in 1853. "We always wanted a Victorian home and we'll live with it's little quirks," Daniel says. "We"re not go- ing to stand up straight when we're 135 years old either." The key to their work on the house is restoration, not renovation. In everything they do, they're attemp- ting to keep the house looking as it might have more than a century ago. Still, they're not adverse to a few modern conveniences like a good heating system or an electric stove. "You want all the best things an old house has in terms of charm and character but you don't want to have to haul wood so Angela can bake bread," he quipps. Peter and Nancy Hvidsten were thinking along the same lines when they decided to build a Victorian replica home. In the spring of 1985 they were thinking of moving off Scugog Island onto a chunk of property on Perry Street that was once the site of an .old foundry. Because the rest of the street is dotted with older homes, they were reluctant to just build a bungalow or something that would jarr with the Victorian feeling of the street. A friend who is deeply involved with antiques and heritage gave them the idea for a replica home, and after searching for blueprints, taking some ideas from some, and other ideas from others, they came up with plans for something they could call their own. The house looks like it was built in the Victorian era and many peo- FA A ple, including the Hvidsten's own relatives, are surprised when they find out it is new. "We had relatives over from Nor- way who said, 'Oh gee, it must cost a lot to heat this old thing,""' Nancy Hvidsten says. In fact, "this old thing' is no pro- blem at all to heat, with its modern Pulse gas furnace, its thick insula- tion and double-paned windows. Peter and Nancy have been over- whelmed by comments about their home and both are pleased with the final results of their efforts. "I just think they (Victorian style homes) have a little more appeal than the modern bungalow of to- day," Peter says. And it seems like the judges of the Real Estate Board's contest couldn't agree more. Howard Forder of Howard Forder Limited Real Estate nominated the Hvidsten home after watching the house be- ing built. "My nominating the Hvidsten home for this award was automatic because of the true era character and design, choice of colours and blending landscaping sets this home out as one of the top outstanding homes in our beautiful Port Perry-- there were ten homes nominated in this category," Mr. Forder says. Cliff Crowell of Ridge North Real- ty nominated the McPhee house because "I've known the house quite a while and the treatment he's done to the outside is excellent. I was delighted that they won." The McPhee's and the Hvidsten"s were also delighted. 'It makes our work seem wor- thwhile when they gave us an award when we're not even finished!" Daniel McPhee said. The winners were awarded specially engraved plaques at a din- ner on October 9. The Hvidsten house on Perry Street was recently chosesn a winner in the Historic Replica category of the Oshawa and District Real Estate Board's home contest. Jon's Auto Repairs Complete Automotive Air Conditioning Service General Repairs to All Makes wy PUNT PERRY » D.O.T. Automotive (& Dump Truck) Inspection Centre 985-8249