Judy Rose

Special to the Detroit Free Press

Nineteen-year-old Grace Briggs married a lumber company heir in 1925, and this stately house in Grosse Pointe Farms was her wedding gift from Dad.

At 7,700 square feet with Tudor timbers over herringbone brick, it’s considered one of the grand old houses of the Grosse Pointes. Its chimneys are massive, the yard is enclosed by a 6-foot brick wall and even the garage is three stories tall.

Dad was Walter O. Briggs, manufacturing mogul and owner of the Detroit Tigers. Briggs’ own imposing stone mansion in Detroit’s historic Boston Edison District was also listed for sale this summer and is currently under contract. It was featured in Michigan House Envy on July 16.

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Grace Briggs’ house has beautiful beam work in several ceilings, heavy arching doors and woodwork, as well as a profusion of leaded glass windows. Even so, the newlyweds were making do with less luxury than their parents.

According to the 1930 U.S. Census, the senior Briggs’ household in Detroit included 10 live-in servants. The Census shows Grace Briggs’ new house had only four.

Inside, woodwork on the main floor is pronounced and handsome — much of it never painted in these 90 years. The foyer has distinctive beams. Off this foyer, all the entries are arched, and those with doors have thick, solid wood doors set in arched wood frames.

The long living room has elaborate carved beams that cover the whole ceiling and wood pilasters up the walls. One wide arched entrance here has a showy carved wood frame topped by five small leaded glass transom windows.

The kitchen has been remodeled from two small utility kitchens to a large, bright room in European country style with carving around some cabinets, lighted shelves inside leaded glass doors and a fireplace at one end.

The owners kept the original wall refrigerator with its multiple wood doors, a 1920s Chrysler & Koppin that works. They use it for beverages when they’re giving a party.

The back side of this wall fridge opens into the butler’s pantry. This bright little room has kept its original cabinets with their wide, shallow drawers for linen and silver and leaded glass doors above to display the china.

The owners also updated five of the 10 bathrooms. Like many grand houses of this time, this has one powder room for women and another for men. The men’s version has a small door that leads to the library, formerly the after-dinner smoking room for men, the owner said.

Outside, the brick work is unusual and intricate. Across the front it’s divided into many sections by Tudor-style beams with no plaster behind them. Inside the shapes made by the beams, the bricks are laid in herringbone patterns.

In the rear, two wings of the house form an L around the yard. Six wide arches make the sides of the L, arches formed with fanned-out bricks and slanting brick pillars. On one side, these arches have been enclosed to make a four-season sun room the owners use for parties.

Grace Briggs’ husband was W. Dean Robinson from the Robinson Lumber Co. He went to work for the Briggs firm and became its president, according to Great Lakes historian John Polacsek. A star pitcher in college for Yale’s baseball team, he shared the Briggs family’s love of baseball and became a director of the Detroit Baseball Club.

When Briggs bought this property, it was part of 42 acres owned by the Sisters of the Sacred Heart, Polacsek said. They used it for their convent, a girls school that's now the Grosse Pointe Academy and a self-sustaining farm. Photos from the time show cows grazing.

The nuns planted trees up and down what's now Kenwood Road, where they'd walk and say the rosary. It's still known locally as "the nuns' walk," and some of the big, old trees still line Kenwood.



Where: 138 Kenwood Road, Grosse Pointe Farms

How much: $1.75 million

Bedrooms: 7

Baths: 10

Square feet: 7,700

Key features: Great old Grosse Pointe mansion has unusual brick detailing and brick walls around the grounds. Fine interior details like woodwork, imported fireplaces and extensive leaded glass. Large, lavish new kitchen in country European style.

Contact: Robert Karwacki , Mt. Vernon Realtors, 248-310-6934.