Bruce's Apartment:

               From his living room window on Baldwin Avenue, Bruce can see if any of his friends are already sitting out at a table in front of Starbucks, across the street. And from his kitchen window, he can read the marquee that tells what’s playing at the NARO Expanded Cinema on Colley Avenue.

              “It’s like that for many, many people who live in Ghent,” says Bruce, who has lived in Cavalier Land apartments throughout Ghent and downtown Norfolk for almost 20 years. “Some people have a great view of the Hague.. Others have the advantage of being just a few blocks from The Chrysler Museum of Art, or the medical school or a place to eat and drink. This old neighborhood is so embraceable, so nurturing and so entertaining -- there is so much to do and so many interesting people to know – it’s just impossible to be bored.”

              A large part of Bruce’s enjoyment of Ghent is his apartment, in a three-story, pre-war brick building at Colley and Baldwin.  With hardwood floors throughout and white stucco walls in the living room for added texture, the one-bedroom apartment “sings to me,” he says. “Between the brightness of the space itself – it has big windows on three sides that drenches it with sunlight – and the way I’ve got it set up, it really makes me smile to walk into this place.”

              Colorful watercolor and acrylic paintings and black-and-white photographs of old and new Norfolk; blond wood, distressed and wicker furniture; handmade pottery and a lamp with a stained-glass shade are among the eye-catchers Bruce has brought into his home. 

              He says it’s an ideal setting for having friends over. He has planted his couch in the middle of the living room floor, which divides the room into two gathering places. The kitchen is spacious enough for a table-for-two, and it offers substantial standing room.

              “My apartment really works for me,” he says. “And I mean that in two ways – the shapes of the rooms and the way Cavalier makes it easy to live here. The maintenance is top-quality. Even when I call and start by saying, `This isn’t anything big, but when you get a chance …’, they treat every maintenance call like it’s very important.” 

              Like many Ghent residents, Bruce is cost-conscious and appreciates the affordability of his Cavalier Land apartment – “especially when I compare it to newer buildings that don’t have any of character of Cavalier’s older places,” he says.

              And like a surprising number of Ghent residents, he lives well without a car of his own, getting around instead by bicycle and two feet. “It’s one of the great benefits of living in the heart of Norfolk,” he says. “My work usually doesn’t demand extensive travel, so I walk or bike to just about everything. It’s great to have work, opera, movies, shopping, sports events, wine tastings and everything else so close and then be able to come home to an apartment that you love.”

Lynne's Apartment:

Two floors above Graydon Avenue, with its wide, green median and stately, century-old trees, Lynne is showing off her three-bedroom apartment with the  speed of a museum guide who hasn’t a moment to waste if the visitor is to see everything.

              “The porch: peaceful,” she says.

              “You can be alone and yet still feel you’re part of the community.” Every day, scores of bicyclists, dog-walkers, joggers and pedestrians en route to work, market or a friend’s house pass her corner, and when Lynne is out  on her porch she sees them all, talks to some and  takes in -- not only fresh air -- but the essence of what the Ghent neighborhood is all about.

              “This community operates the way communities used to operate” – with houses and apartments mixed together, buildings coming out to the sidewalk, people able to make short trips on foot, and opportunities for residents to really know each other, if they want to. “I like that Cavalier Land specializes in old Ghent apartments.”

              But back to Lynne’s tour:

              “High ceilings: a must.

              “And the unexpected, quirky things.” She takes you into a small niche between the dining area and the kitchen, and then into the kitchen itself, where in both places cupboards with glass panes reveal plates and cups and bowls and other kitchen wares, making everyday objects not pieces to hide … but to show off and add color and character to the indoor environment.

                 The apartment, which Lynne shares with Chad, is filled with souvenirs of their lives. Original art and framed posters fill the walls. Much of it is the work of painters who pitch their tents once every spring and once every fall at the Stockley Gardens Arts Festival, presented every year by Hope House Foundation, of which Lynne is executive director. Many of the furniture pieces that Lynne brought to Graydon Avenue are family furnishings – dark wood cabinets and tables and chairs that perform just s well at dinner parties and other gatherings of friends today as they did generations ago. The more contemporary pieces are Chad’s contributions.

              “You can mix new stuff with the older,” she says. “Chad’s stuff makes it work.”

              “I don’t like clutter,” she continues, “but I want to live in a way that makes people talk.” In this apartment, that has a double-meaning. The living room is arranged in a way geared for conversation first and TV-watching second. 

              Lynne also dismisses certain notions about renting. “I have a beautiful apartment, in a great neighborhood, and I can live here for as long as I want.  Why move when you have a very reasonable rent, especially compared to what I’d pay at the newer buildings?

              “I can’t beat this quality-of-life.”

June 2010 article from Hampton Roads Magazine:

See one of our Ghent buildings, The Warren, featured in the June 2010 issue of Hampton Roads Magazine INSIDE:  A GHENT APARTMENT.  The article originally appeared in Hampton Roads Magazine www.hamptonroadsmagazine.com