Soldiers & Sailors architect designed home for sale in Monroeville

There are quite a few surprises inside the stately Monroeville house at 1397 Abers Creek Road.

First is the stark contrast of the early-20th-century exterior with the thoroughly modern trappings on the interior. But the 3,450-square-foot house, which sits on just over 11 acres, also has an architectural pedigree.

The man who dreamed it up, Henry Hornbostel, also designed Pittsburgh’s Soldiers & Sailors Memorial Hall, multiple buildings on the Carnegie Mellon University campus, the City-County Building in Downtown, the University Club in Oakland, Rodef Shalom synagogue in Shadyside and more.

“He was also the architect for the Williamsburg Bridge in Brooklyn,” said Bill Jacoby, an agent with Compass Real Estate, which has the three-bedroom, 4½-bath house on the market for $1 million. “He was one of the people patronized by Andrew Carnegie. Carnegie brought him here to the Mellon Institute, and he convinced Carnegie to let him start what would become the architecture school at Carnegie Mellon.”

Hornbostel built the house in the 1930s for Charles R. Anthony, president of the International Staple and Machine Co.

Paula Montgomery, a Realtor with Compass, bought the house after returning to the Pittsburgh area from California in 2014.

“I saw it in the Pennysaver, and I was looking for something that had some real architectural interest,” Montgomery said. “At the time, the price was about $360,000, but it was kind of a wreck.”

After renting the house out for a year, Montgomery began renovation work in 2016.

“It was a complete gut,” she said. “There was a two-car garage that’s now a family room. We put an addition on the back of the house with a garage, mud room, bathroom and another room, and we were actually able to match the slate so it doesn’t even look like an addition.”

The main changes are on the interior, where Montgomery opted to fill the house with modern amenities.

“There was very little we could salvage on the interior,” she said. “My taste is a little different from most people, and I decided to go very modern inside. My intent was to create this juxtaposition between the inside and outside. I wanted people to walk in and go ‘Wow, this is not what I expected.’ ”

The interior floor plan is open, with white walls and a great room with floors done in multiple coats of epoxy.

“Paula has a really great eye, and for that floor, she wanted it to have some real depth, to almost look like the ocean at night,” Jacoby said. “The former enclosed porch was opened up, and during renovations, they also found that the ceiling in the living room was much higher than it appeared.”

“It’s very open, and it’s very much a house for entertaining,” Montgomery said. “We did a ton of lighting and things that just make it more fun on the inside.”

Jacoby said Compass has held a few cocktail hours and events at the property.

“It doesn’t fit everyone, but for someone who likes to have grand parties or big family reunions, it’s beautiful,” he said. “I think it would make a wonderful Airbnb for the right owner. It’s very eclectic-on-purpose.”

Montgomery said her vision was for potential homeowners to have a bit of a Dorothy Gale moment, as they walked into the modern interior after seeing the historic quality of the exterior.

“The idea was to sort of go from Kansas to Oz,” she said. “I wanted that dichotomy, and that’s the effect that we ended up getting.”

The home at 1397 Abers Creek Road in Monroeville is listed for sale at Compass.com.