Getting settled in Society Hill

In 1971, Bill Armstrong and Russell Harris bought a new townhouse in Society Hill and enjoyed life there for the next 43 years. They socialized with neighbors, including the former mayor, Richardson Dilworth, who died in 1974, and his wife. "We had cocktails in their garden," Bill remembers. Bill and Russell spent weekends at a cottage in Bucks County and traveled.

Bill, who managed the Robert Allen showroom at the Marketplace Design Center in Center City, often went to London for business for his firm, a manufacturer and distributor of fine fabrics. He also vacationed abroad with Russell, a federal court reporter. On their travels and at antiques stores in Philadelphia they purchased a treasure trove of artifacts and furniture.

While others might go to the theater or museums, Bill says, "It was fun for us to go to an auction in London, buy something and bring it home."

The couple's idyllic existence ended in 2014 when Russell died after a long illness.

Bill, who grew up in Delaware County, had never lived alone. The home he and Russell shared had two bedrooms, two baths, a den, a two-story living room and a terrace. He knew he had to downsize, but where and to what?

Bill decided he wanted to stay in Society Hill. He looked at area high-rise condos but they seemed too radical a lifestyle change. Instead, two years ago, he took a long-term lease on a street-level condo a few blocks from his old home.

The rooms were spacious but the condo had only one bedroom. Large-scale furniture would have to go. Some items were sold at Freeman's auction house and elsewhere, other items were given to family members. Bill's former home had parquet floors covered in oriental rugs. He installed pale beige wall-to-wall carpets in his new place. "It unifies the space," he says.

Honeydew melon-colored walls provide a backdrop for a display of blue-and-white Canton ware. "I got rid of a whole collection of English china," Russell says. "Somebody else is going to enjoy them."

Above the living room sofa hangs a painting of a tree by local artist Michael Rossman. It is flanked by sconces of two turbaned Moors; Russell and Bill commissioned the sconces from a wood carver in Venice. The Rossman painting and the 19th-century bird prints and floral watercolors in the kitchen were artfully framed by Ursula Hobson, "the top framer in the city," Bill asserts, "she does all my framing." The watercolors by Walter Cleveland came from the Newman Gallery in Philadelphia. "They were one of the first purchases Russell and I made together," Bill says.

Airy window treatments let light into the small space. Bill had sofas and chairs reupholstered. To decorate his new residence, he employed the services of several vendors at the Marketplace Design Center. "I called in all my favors," he says.

Bill, who is retired from Robert Allen, studied design at Philadelphia College of Art, now University of the Arts, and still does some interior design consulting. For his own home, he repurposed a secretary that Russell had filled with books. It is now a china cabinet. A chest from London, painted with a handsome whippet dog, found a place in the bedroom. A door from a tole pie safe, lacquered with a black-and-gold Oriental scene, hangs on a wall.

Instead of a terrace, Bill has just a brick planter by the front door. He has filled it with geraniums from a nursery in Bucks County where he still visits friends.

When he entertains, he sets the antique Hepplewhite table with red, white, and blue dovetail-patterned china from Booths in London.

Bill and Russell purchased the 19th-century Regency dining room chairs at an auction in London. "Everything I have has a memory," Bill says.

He is adjusting to a new life with Haley, a 15-year-old Cavalier King Charles spaniel for company. The breed originated in Great Britain. "I guess I'm an Anglophile," Bill admits.