Just as RMS Titanic was setting sail on its maiden voyage to America in 1912, a craftsman style house was coming out of the ground near Denver’s Observatory Park. Two current owners have now given it a Titanic-inspired makeover, and this Saturday Nostalgic Homes agent Jenny Apel will give you a look, everything but the iceberg.

Sellers Jennifer Volin and Troy Schaetzle bought the house at 2324 S. Columbine Street during the pandemic and like many homeowners, took on a home project when there were few other things to do.

“This wasn’t a flip; these owners have a passion for vintage,” Apel said. “Anyone might have seen it as a teardown and they might have done the same, but the moment caught them, and they did a studs-in renovation, with every element of this home touched.”

Titanic backstory

That project started by creating a Titanic-inspired backstory, playing on her Finnish ancestry and his German. “It was as if two survivors, a Finnish builder and German stenograph salesman, had created this unique reimagination,” Apel said.

Included was a complete retrofit of the home’s systems as well as the cosmetics. When the pair ran out of authentic detailing to incorporate from what was on site, they reached out via Facebook for other period components — wallpaper, pocket doors, trim, even oak floors — finding some in Midwest towns hundreds of miles east, where they drove to haul them home.

The project took 14 months. “When I saw it, I was taken by it,” says Apel, whose Nostalgic Homes Group at Compass specializes in vintage houses. “It’s like stepping into a movie scene.” Moments include a Titanic inspired cocktail lounge and entertaining spaces that Apel says work for a romantic dinner-for-two or for a blowout celebration for 80-plus guests.

Those are along with shipboard-inspired built-ins, a chef’s kitchen, a main-floor primary suite that has loft-styled exposed trusses and ductwork, and two original quartz river-rock fireplaces. Apel calls the outdoor spaces magical, showing a period front porch, custom landscape, rear decks, a fireside seating area and grill, and two spas, one of them a swim-in-place unit.

The 6-bedroom/5-bath plan delivers 4,066 square feet of finished space including a finished basement with additional guest and media space, and a studio designed for motorcycles, hobbies or as an ADU conversion off the alley-load oversized 3-car garage. The couple, heading off for a new project downtown, have it priced at $2.25 million on a block that shows numbers of recent comparable sales.

Chamberlin Observatory

When the home was completed, the University of Denver’s Chamberlin Observatory was already 22 years old, having had its 20-inch refractor telescope carefully installed in 1894. The observatory and its namesake park, two blocks east, host regular public events, including a monthly star party on Saturday night Nov. 8, starting after sunset, with a chance to gaze through the scope. 

That nearby park is in addition other attractions, including the university’s Newman Center for the Performing Arts and a couple of eateries two blocks west, plus lots of additional dining a little further north in the university’s town center. “It’s a super walkable neighborhood,” Apel said. She’ll hold the home open Saturday, noon until 3 p.m. 

OPEN THIS SATURDAY:

OPEN HOUSE: Saturday, Nov. 1, noon-to-3 p.m. WHERE: 2324 S. Columbine St., Denver; from I-25 take University Blvd south 4 blocks to E. Iliff Avenue, turn left (east) and proceed two blocks to Columbine Street.

SIZE: 6 bedrooms/ 5 baths, 4,066 sq. ft.  PRICE: $2.25 million  WEB: bit.ly/2324scolumbine  AGENT: Jenny Apel, 303-570-9690

PHOTOS: Good Karma Photo