1320 Shepherd St. - Harkrader House

35.985802, -78.913523

1320
Shepherd Street
Durham
NC
Cross Street
Wells Street
Year built
1974
Architects/Designers
Harkrader, Richard
Builder
New Morning Construction
Architectural style
Postmodern
Contemporary
Construction type
Frame
Slab
Passive Solar
Solar Hot Water
Photovoltaic
Neighborhood
Morehead Hill
Use
Residence
Building Type
Residential
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1999

The land on which the house above sits was vacant through much of the early-to-mid 20th century owing to the streambed which diagonally bisects the parcel. In 1935, when Furman Bridgers and his wife Margaret built their house on the tract immediately west of this house at 1325 Arnette Avenue, they acquired this tract as well, forming a large house plot extending through the block from Arnette to Shepherd. When they divorced in 1948, the two parcels were conveyed to Margaret, who sold the 1325 Arnette parcel to Dr. Richard Pearse. It's unclear to me what immediately happened to this parcel, but it was owned by Robert Holleman and his wife Ruth when they conveyed it on 05.28.58 to LR and Margaret Chambers. The Chambers conveyed the parcel to "Eastmark Investment Company" on 06.30.66. Eastmark appears to have been a business interest for the Chambers. They then sold it to Richard and Lonna Harkrader on 04.05.74.

The Harkraders built for themselves what would be a ~prototype for a multitude of other passive solar houses that made good use of clever siting and contemporary design to build on what had been considered 'difficult' parcels upon which to site a house.

Looking northeast, 05.12.2013

2000 square feet, 2 stories.

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Comments

Submitted by Carson on Sat, 2/15/2014 - 1:58pm

My parents, Richard and Lonna Harkrader, built this house together. Previously, they had lived in two other houses further north on Shepherd Street, and noticed the for sale sign on this lot. The way they tell the story of buying the lot, they put in a low ball offer to the lot owner, and then left for vacation (with no phone or email back in those days). They found out that the owner had accepted their offer when they returned home after a week or two. The owner told them "good luck building anything on that lot." The kitchen of the house tucks into the hill, so that the kitchen window looks out onto ground level. They left a large space near the street where they built a very prolific organic garden.

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