A "Village" in Pennsylvania: A couple's weekend retreat becomes an expansive compound, including a former hotel, a Victorian farm house and a stone home on the water. This is a home that a pair of doctors thought that they were just buying a small cottage to use as their weekend home but they discovered over the last 30 years that they really couldn't just let any of the surrounding properties go to waste so they actually built up what they actually now call "their little Village". It is this amazing compound almost 50 acres altogether, one building that was going to be condemned was a former hotel that was used by the local fire department for burning exercise but they restored it and saved it. The jewel of the property is this tiny stone mill property that it is right on the water, there is in fact a river that runs through the property. From the home actually you can hear the bubbling stream – you can really feel surrounded by the water. For the Glenwood is the focal point of a tiny hamlet of Mill Rift, once a source of wood, hay, and bluestone, and a summer resort for New Yorkers: now an idyllic village undergoing a transformation from ruins to something much more precious than it ever was before. The reason? Exquisite natural beauty, proximity to New York and Northern New Jersey, and charming aged structure. Those who come to Mill Rift usually end up wandering in this beautiful setting and are transported into a magical spiritual world. The restored and improved Glenwood Hotel has large fireplace constructed of multicolored granite blocks in the 1930's. The hotel is decorated with exquisite European touches of a time gone by. The veranda has a glass wall that affords a view of the lake, the stone bridge, and the waterwheel. The Glenwood is over 100 years old, and still very popular with local visitors. They invariably remember working there in their youth, or "My Grampa stayed here", or "My mother met my father here" is what they say. The hotel, once condemned and slated for death by fire, now has a formal but friendly atmosphere and a classic Pennsylvania Dutch style. Peter and Joe, or "The two doctors" as they are known locally, have painstakingly restored and upgraded the whole hotel property, some 40 acres. The steel swimming pool is now heated and surrounded by terrace, and the basketball courts have been converted into new tennis courts. The dock has been romantically rebuilt on the lake, and a wooden boat is tethered there, invitingly. The hotel has two floors of rooms, each with an elegant private bath with marble and glass-block shower, many overlooking the lake. There is an expansive terrace with a stone fire-pit like the ones seen in the Arizona desert resorts, to warm the cool evenings of the fall when the foliage is breathtaking. The old -fashioned long wooden tables in the main dining room, with beamed ceiling and dark-wood floor transports you to Tuscany, making it the perfect place for a meal. The former wooden bridge over the Bush Kill collapsed in the 1980's. Now it is rebuilt, with a roof, modeled after the famous alpine bridge in Bassano del Grappa, Italy. When visitors approach they find etched into a huge boulder the famous words of the Bassano del Grappa bridge song, adapted into English: On the bridge of Bassano at Mill Rift, we will hold hands and kiss each other, a little kiss of love. Stone foundations of former barns, long since collapsed, have been transmogrified into a romantic cottage here, or an art studio there, overlooking the mountains, or cascading waterfalls. Peter and Joe originally came to Mill Rift in 1982, to convert an abandoned stone saw-mill at the foot of a spectacular waterfall, into a rustic yet elegant home, reminiscent of a stone house in Tuscany. The Glenwood is their ultimate project, years in the making at great cost, both monetary and emotional. Mill Rift is not very far away from the Tuscan sun.
This property is off market, which means it's not currently listed for sale or rent on Zillow. This may be different from what's available on other websites or public sources.
