Want to live in a home that "breaks the mold"? North Kingstown's Poplar Point Lighthouse, listed by Judy Chace of Residential Properties Ltd., was crowned the "Best Nontraditional" home in the 2012 Doory Awards, a competition on HGTV's FrontDoor.com. The contest was meant to celebrate America's best homes for sale and spanned over four weeks on the website, from April 2nd to April 29th.
Properties were divided into twenty categories, and the public was asked to pick their favorite in each group. FrontDoor.com editors scoured more than 4 million listings and reviewed submissions from real estate agents to choose the nominees for the 20 categories of the Doory Awards. Poplar Point was one of 10 nominees chosen in the Nontraditional, or out-of-the-ordinary, category, where it was voted "Best", getting 18,898 votes out of 120,539 (15.68%). The competition for "Favorite Overall Home and Outdoor Space" ended on May 11th, and the results came out on May 17th, with a house in Kamuela, Hawaii (you can't beat that location) earning the title.
Still, the Poplar Point Lighthouse is one of the coolest homes ever. It was built in 1831, and was used to protect Wickford Harbor until it was decommissioned in 1882. The octagonal tower is the oldest wooden lighthouse in America. The original building included a forty feet by twenty feet stone dwelling, but a large addition was built onto the structure in the early 1900s, creating a Y shape. Set on 1.7 waterfront acres, the home is 4,600 square feet and has retained the nautical character of the original lighthouse. The current owners of this landmark property have extensively renovated the structure and its adjacent four-bedroom residence, which features a screened-in porch, a wood-paneled office and a breakfast room. The property includes an observation deck, waterfront terraces, and an in-ground swimming pool, as well as a dock and a three-bedroom guesthouse.
To learn more about the history of Poplar Point, check out The Lighthouses of Rhode Island by Jeremy D'Entremont.
Residential Properties Ltd. has been serving sellers and buyers of distinctive properties since 1981 through service, innovation and sheer hard work. The company, with five offices located in Barrington, Cumberland, East Greenwich, Narragansett and Providence, services all of Rhode Island, the Connecticut shoreline and southeastern and central Massachusetts. In addition, the relocation department assists buyers and sellers on transactions throughout the country.