Any interest in living in a former chicken coop? How about a squash court? Some might hesitate, even in the tight Oak Park housing market. However, it might be worth a second look if that coop and court were located in the bucolic estate section of the village and carried an interesting architectural pedigree — and let’s not forget these outbuildings were converted to a single family home in 1921, with a cupola. For a house story unlike any other, it’s worth a look at 711 Superior.
The Blatchford connection
In 1887, the well-to-do Paul and Francis Blatchford purchased a lot on the corner of Oak Park’s Forest Avenue and Elizabeth Court, and built a stick-style Victorian home, which they dubbed, Plasderw, Welsh for “place among the oaks.”
Three years later, they decamped to an Italianate-style home at 333 N. Euclid. At that time, they relocated the old barn from their Forest Avenue home — dating from the 1880s — to the corner of their lot at Euclid and Superior. Not content to rest on their real estate, in 1897 they moved their Italianate-style house to 333 N. Linden and constructed a new home on their lot on Euclid.Â
The Blatchfords hired a Chicago architecture firm, headed by two brothers, Irving Kane Pond and Allen Bartlett Pond, to design the new home. Pond & Pond was founded in 1886, with Irving Pond as the primary architect. He began his career in the offices of William LeBaron Jenney, credited as the designer of the world’s first skyscraper. Irving later became the head draftsman in the office of Chicago architect Solon Spencer Beman, where he helped design and supervise the construction of the Pullman community.
For the Blatchfords, Irving designed a brick home in 1897, based loosely on the American Arts & Crafts style with Italianate touches. In 1909, the Blatchfords called upon Pond & Pond again, this time to design a squash court, garage, and dovecote to go with the existing hen house and barn on the property. Irving Pond’s watercolor sketches depict a design that combined the American Arts & Crafts style with significant Italianate influences, including a cupola on the roof.Â
The Blatchfords reconsidered their property needs one more time in 1921 when their first child, son John Lord Blatchford, married the next door neighbor’s daughter, Esther Roberts, the niece of architect E.E. Roberts. The graduate of MIT and his new bride needed a place to live, so the Blatchfords hired Pond & Pond for the third go-round, this time to convert the barn/squash court/hen house into a single-family home for the newlyweds.Â
John and Esther Blatchford welcomed a son, Thomas, into the home in 1925, and continued to reside there until 1947 when John died. Esther continued to live in the cottage until the 1960s.
That home today bears the address, 711 Superior.
Passing the torch
Current owners Keith Stolte and partner Brian Ortiz purchased the cottage several years ago. Loathe to leave their Old Town home in Chicago, they never moved into the Oak Park house, but Stolte conducted extensive research into the structure’s past.Â
“Whenever I buy something,” he said, “I do research on it.”
Stolte noted that after Esther Blatchford died, her sister and husband moved in, and the house remained in the family until 1984 with minimal updates to the 1921 renovation.
“Throughout all those owners and all of those years,” he said, “the barn still feels like a barn.”
An interior tour of the home reveals that the barn — now a living space — retains many of the original 1880s touches. The walls are clad in bead board, and there is still evidence of the hayloft and a cut-out for a trough. The attached chicken coop now serves as a family room for the home.
The squash court was added in 1909 because John Blatchford came home from college with an appreciation for the sport. It was converted into a formal living room in the 1921 renovations.
Noted Stolte, “As a squash court, it had higher ceilings and a balcony. In 1921, they put in a ceiling. Typical of squash courts, what is on the walls is the same as the flooring.”
 The maple floors have kept their stained-wood form, but on the walls, the maple has been painted white. Large casement windows, original to the squash court, open out into the courtyard of the home.
In the living room, the fireplace, added in the 1921 conversion, was the source of some debate, according to Stolte’s research.
“Mrs. Blatchford didn’t want to spend the money to add a fireplace in here. Pond convinced her to do it. There is correspondence indicating that since John [Blatchford] had two or three mantels, they might as well add a fireplace since it would only cost about $300.”
A breakfast room with built-in cabinetry and a small kitchen round out the first floor. Stolte noted that while he and Ortiz never got around to renovating the house, it would make sense to open up the kitchen into the former barn space to create a more open floor plan.
On the second floor, a bedroom created out of the L-shaped barn building includes original bead-board walls and ceilings, storage under the eaves and a pulley over the old hay loft. The master bedroom includes a cedar closet for storage. Original parquet floors and casement windows bring a sense of cottage charm to the home.
With an interior courtyard set away from the street, the yard of the home feels private. Looking at it from the yard, Stolte said, the home has considerable charm.
“I think architecturally, it’s more Italian-nuanced with the tower,” he said, “but it would certainly fit in well in the English countryside.
“We definitely were going to move here,” he said, “but then we couldn’t leave our other home. I was torn about this place because I love it. It’s such an enchanting, charming building.”
Stolte and Ortiz have listed the home for sale with Gloor Realty’s Jeanne Fagan and hope that the next owners will appreciate both the charm and the history.Â
Fagan, who is listing the home for $585,000, thinks it’s hard to ignore what makes this place special.Â
“It’s kept its integrity,” she said.