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The Kirkpatrick & Co. Approach | Marketing Your Home
Our full-service boutique brokerage is known for our bespoke marketing with just the right touch. We build a specific suite of marketing strategies customized for each property.
You can rest assured your property will be presented efficaciously & graciously– to a well-qualified group [...]
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October 16, 2024
Why are so many Bluegrass roads “mills”?
The Bluegrass, rich in flowing water, was once studded with historic mills. Today, many modern thoroughfares bear the names of these once essential hearts of commerce.
Most of the region’s mills were grist mills, used to process corn. The corn was then used for cooking, animal feed, or preserved through distillation [...]
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October 11, 2024
Thomas Metcalfe “Old Stone Hammer” | Building the Bluegrass
10th Kentucky Governor Thomas Metcalfe made an impressive mark on the Commonwealth both politically and architecturally. Metcalfe’s beginnings as a humble stonemason and later as a fierce politician left him with a well-earned nickname, “Old Stone Hammer.”
Raised in modest settings in Kentucky and his native Virginia, Metcalfe was apprenticed to [...]
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September 25, 2024
Morris L. Levy | Building the Bluegrass
Lexington, Kentucky developer, builder, & realtor Morris Levy was a significant shaper of the Bluegrass landscape.
Born in Kiev before the turn of the century, Levy immigrated to Cincinnati before finding work in Lexington as a tailor. By the 1920s, he was immersed in Bluegrass real estate. In 1949, his company, [...]
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July 18, 2024
Magdalen Harvey McDowell | Bluegrass Architects to Know
“In a day woman’s sphere was thought to be confined to the drawing room, the kitchen and the nursery, [she] sought an outlet for her genius in painting, architecture, kindred activities.” Obituary, The Lexington Herald
As a young woman in Louisville
Born in Fincastle, Virginia in 1829, Magdalen Harvey McDowell was a [...]
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July 9, 2024
Keene, Kentucky | Historic Bluegrass Hamlet
This small hamlet in Jessamine County was first known as “North Liberty.” It was later renamed “Keene” when several Keene, New Hampshire residents moved there. The vibrant community quickly grew to include a grist mill, hemp factory & rope walks, tailor, hatter & more.
19th century Business Directory Map of Keene, [...]
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May 14, 2024
Herman L. Rowe | Bluegrass Architects to Know
1839-1913
Herman Rau was born in Genoa but educated in his homeland, Germany. After completing his degree in Stuttgart, he made his way to Chicago, anglicizing his name to “Rowe” and meeting his wife, Nellie.
Rowe was invited to supervise the building of “Old Main” at what is now the University of [...]
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May 9, 2024
Martin Geertz | Bluegrass Architects to Know
Martin Geertz 1854-1946
Largely forgotten, the architect Martin Geertz’s handiwork has outlived his legacy in the Bluegrass. Some of his works have even been misattributed in recent years. Arriving in Lexington, Kentucky in the 1870s, Geertz quickly developed a reputation for his versatility, designing buildings including “apartment flats”, lovely estates, cottages, [...]
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April 8, 2024
Paint the Town Chinese Vermillion! Vibrant Historic Paint Colors in Lexington
The Colorful Bluegrass
We’ve always known Lexington, Kentucky is a colorful place to live. We were surprised to find how literally true that was all along. From the earliest days in the “Athens of the West,” residents were enlivening their walls with punchy colors of paint.
Chinese Vermillion. Prussian Blue. Patent Yellow. [...]
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March 7, 2024
Thomas Lewinski | Bluegrass Architects to Know
When Thomas Lewinski arrived in Lexington in 1842, he was among the first professional architects in the region that included Gideon Shryock & John McMurtry. Born in London to a Polish father and English mother, Lewinski had pursued the priesthood before finding he was more suited to military life. The [...]
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February 26, 2024