What $850,000 will get you in Philly

Rico says it would definitely require a lottery win, but Lauren Mennen has an article at Philly.com about a nice house downtown:

Fascinated with American history, Beth Adelson wanted to be close to our country’s deepest roots. And, on Elfreth’s Alley in Old City, it doesn’t get much better than that.
“The principals of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are so deeply beautiful and inspiring that I wanted to be where that had started.” So, when Adelson, a professor at Rutgers University, was moving from another Center City home in 1996, she found a row home on Elfreth’s Alley that she couldn’t pass up.
The historic home she purchased, on the country’s oldest residential block, is the largest on the street: located at 135 Elfreth’s Alley, the home is a double lot, and has a fourteen-hundred-square-brick patio.
Like the other thirty homes on the narrow cobblestone street, Adelson’s home has a story behind the brick walls. Built in 1771 for a French winemaker, the home was also home to Haym Saloman, a financier during the Revolutionary War.
“He had gone broke because he had given all of his money to the army,” Adelson said, “and he lived in the attic.” The attic is now being used as a spare bedroom, and is big enough to fit an office as well, Adelson said.
Remnants of its eighteenth-century history can be found throughout the home. And Adelson made it a point to keep up with the restoration. “It was very well-preserved,” she said. “All of the floors, moldings, beams, and plaster work on the walls is original and true from the 1700s.”
When Adelson moved in, the interior had been somewhat modernized, with rugs covering the hardwood floors, and mirrors on the walls. But Adelson removed all that, exposing as much original details as possible. She hired architect and designer Jefferson Clark, who was trained by Louis Kahn, to help with her renovations. She did a complete renovation of the kitchen, installing new cabinets, granite countertops, and Bosch appliances.
But Adelson was careful to keep up with the original style by designing rooms for multiple uses. “Rooms were used in different ways back then,” she said, “they would have one use during the day, and a different at night.”
For example, Adelson made the master bedroom suite function as both a private and public space. During the day, she uses it as a living room with a sitting space. At night, it's a bedroom.
The basement (photo), which was where the original kitchen was located, is now being used to hold a sauna and hot tub. The original stone and brick walls are visible throughout the space. The home also includes private decks on the second and third floors, four fireplaces with hand-carved mantles, and a second kitchen on the third floor.
Now after almost two decades in the home, she is selling the historic gem to move into the Art Museum area to be closer to her work as a meditation teacher. She has put the home on the market for $850,000.