PHOTO CREDIT: Courtesy of Great Rock Auctions 



PHOTO CAPTION: The luxury single-family home at 20 Brimmer St., which sold for $4.38 million to an anonymous buyer last week.

Less than one month after the luxury single-family home at 20 Brimmer St. failed to fetch an opening bid of $4.975 million at a live auction, an anonymous buyer purchased the 5,700 square-foot brownstone for $4.38 million last week.
Jeremy Freid, principal of the fledgling Back Bay firm Great Rock Auctions, said the buyer agreed to several financial terms that made the offer attractive to the seller, including closing on the property by March 31.
“In this instance, the auction marketing procured several buyers who expressed interest in the property,” Freid said. “We were retained Feb. 1, and we achieved our goal of selling the property within 60 days.”
Developers Peter and Elizabeth Georgantas purchased the dilapidated 1860s five-bedroom townhouse for $2.25 million about four years ago and spent an additional $4 million in renovating the home to include a wine cellar, green house and wet bar in the library, among other new features.
In September of 2008, following the crash of the real estate market, the home was put up for sale for $8.95 million, but couldn’t find a buyer. The price of the townhouse was subsequently reduced to $7.95 million and then $7 million, without attracting any offers that the seller deemed acceptable.
Great Rock originally intended to sell the Brimmer Street home in tandem with a nearby two-bedroom, approximately 2,400 square-foot brownstone at 25 Lime St., but that property found a buyer before the March 3 auction.

PHOTO CREDIT: Tabitha Sherrell of Sherrell Photography

PHOTO CAPTION: Real and Sheila Roy with their daughter/employee Stacey Roy
Lai (far left) are seen at Boston Consignment in Needham.

For newcomers to Boston Consignment in Needham, entering the 4,000 square-foot showroom filled with upscale furnishings, light fixtures, Oriental rugs and fine arts can come as a surprise.
“When people walk in expecting a used furniture store, they’re blown away by the quality of our inventory,” said Sheila Roy, who opened the store with her husband Real in July. “Everything is handpicked from 18th century pieces to furniture from companies like Baker and Henkle-Harris that date back just 10 or 15 years.”
The Roys lived on Beacon Street in the ‘70s and ‘80s before opening Cachet, a high-end consignment store in Fairfield, Conn., in 2001. They closed the store last year, opting to bring the concept to the Greater Boston area, where their children and grandchildren now live.
“We still have clients in Manhattan and Connecticut and regularly send down a truck to deliver and pick up items,” Sheila Roy said. “It gives the store a unique twist because it has that Manhattan flair thrown in.”
For local residents thinking of downsizing their homes, Boston Consignment offers on-site appraisals and uses a professional moving company to ship desirable items to the store. The items are then professionally cleaned and sold in the showroom. Per Boston Consignments’ terms, consignors keep 60 percent of the sale price while the shop pockets the remaining 40 percent.
“I like to think we’re part of the recycling and greening movement,” Sheila Roy said. “We are offering a larger community service because people previously didn’t know where to bring special pieces that they wanted to sell.”
Sheila Roy also likes to think that Boston Consignments has played a role in changing the common perception of consignment stores.
“The concept of consignment has taken a giant leap forward in the last couple of years, and we like to think we’re a part of that because we sell high-end pieces,” she said.
Boston Consignment is located at 238 Highland Ave. in Needham. The store’s hours of operation are Mondays through Saturdays 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Sundays noon to 5 p.m. For more information, visit www.bostonconsigns.com or call 781-449-0900.

Farmers used to call March the hungry month and were happy to have it over. Root cellars at area farms run low this time of year and new crops are just being planted. These days things are slowly changing for farmers and shoppers.

Greenhouse vegetables, winter farmers' markets, and community supported agriculture (CSA) provide year-round income for some Massachusetts farm families.

At the same time, fans of fresh and local food enjoy more winter crops from area farms. "I had some amazing spinach from the Waltham Fields hoop house yesterday – it’s been growing back all winter," said Hannah Thomas Freedberg, Development and Outreach Director for Mass Farmers' Markets. She explained that the amount of local food grown in greenhouses or under plastic is increasing.

If farmers have markets to sell their goods, they can and will grow crops during the winter. The past season saw busy winter markets in Downtown Crossing, Waltham, Framingham and Attleboro.

The Boston Public Market Association is working to find a site and the funding to open a year-round Public Market in Boston.

Over in the Fenway, the Marshall family from Gloucester, turned a former gas station into "Marshall's Fenway Farm Stand," a four-season outpost to sell their goods and those of other local food producers.

Jeff Barry, founder of Boston Organics, a service that delivers a box of fresh produce to area homes on a weekly or bi-weekly basis, works with area farms to fill his "Dogma Box." "This is a box consisting of items sourced as close to Boston as possible. It represents our best effort to provide food coming from a healthy food network. Local is a big part of the equation, but so are organic, sustainable growing practices," Barry said.

This new Fresh & Local column will feed you the latest news on local produce, meats and artisan food. You'll also read about the people who produce local food, and where you can buy it. Have a question on the Boston locavore scene? Send an email to Penny@BostonZest.com, and you might just find it answered in a future column.

Over the last century, a careful mix of natural and manmade features has helped the Esplanade grow into a place of beauty and tranquility in the heart of Boston. The Esplanade Association (TEA) introduces its new “Esplanade Collection” program to help restore and preserve the historic park’s unmatched collection of trees, historic structures, statuary and striking vistas and at the same time provide you with spectacular and unique gift giving ideas for Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, graduations, weddings, anniversaries and birthdays.
With TEA’s Esplanade Collection, you can sponsor an historic Shurcliff bench, adopt a tree or plant flowers as a one-of-a-kind gift for someone special or to commemorate an important occasion. Your gift also will serve as a celebration of the Esplanade’s Centennial Year.

Regardless of which program in the park’s collection you choose to support, your gift will go a long way toward ensuring that the Esplanade continues to provide a beautiful and welcoming setting for every visitor. Your contribution strengthens our efforts on behalf of the Esplanade, which recently received historic-landmark designation from the City of Boston. Park patronage will help to improve quality of life for thousands of Boston residents, and delight the three million people who visit the park each year.
Here is how you can help:

Adopting a tree helps TEA care for the Esplanade’s roughly 2,000 wide array of tree species. When you adopt a tree, you support our pruning and maintenance initiative, which keeps the park’s trees healthy and strong. As a tree sponsor, you can request a certificate, photograph and map showing the location of your tree.
Sponsoring a bench provides a concrete way to underwrite a broader regimen of general improvements and maintenance, and TEA will install a customized bronze plaque at the site of your bench, recognizing you or anyone you wish to honor.
Planting flowers will add grace notes to the park’s mature beauty and carry special significance for Bostonians, announcing the arrival of spring after our interminable winter. And because flowers have for century’s symbolized remembrance and pleasure in the company of others, sponsoring the planting of Esplanade flowers makes a particularly thoughtful gift for the special people in your life.
To learn more about how to sponsor the park’s collection, contact Justin Burke at 617-227-0365 or jburke@esplanadeassociation.org

“Community Table,” a free program for eligible senior citizens of the North End, West End and Beacon Hill, will kick off on Thursday, April 8, at a gala luncheon celebration at Community Work Services at 174 Portland St.
The ABCD North End/West End Neighborhood Service Center (NE/WE NSC) and Community Work Services (CWS) are partnering in the new program to provide senior citizens in their neighborhoods with a hot lunch along with activities such as exercises, guest speakers, music, dancing and holiday celebrations.
Community Work Services sponsors a culinary arts program and their students will cook and serve hot meals for 20 to 30 seniors twice a week.
The NE/WE NSC is part of Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD) and is an antipoverty agency that provides educational and social services to nearly 2,400 North End, West End and Beacon Hill residents a year.
Community Work Services is a local agency that helps more than 700 Boston-area residents who face barriers to work to obtain employment and to achieve greater self-sufficiency through innovative job training, placement, and support services. Founded by a group of charitable women in 1877 as the Cooperative Society of Visitors Among the Poor of Boston, Community Work Services is the oldest vocational rehabilitation facility in the United States.
The original purpose of CWS (which was known as Community Workshops, Inc. at the time) was to provide vocational training to struggling members of Boston's West End neighborhood. Over the years, the agency and the area expanded the scope of programs and widened the range of the populations and the area served. Through it all, helping challenged members of the greater Boston community reach their potential through commitment to outstanding vocational programs and services has always been at the forefront of its mission.
The Community Table lunch is an innovative opportunity to serve neighbors in need and to prepare CWS’ participants to enter a growing culinary arts field. The program will be provided on Tuesdays and Thursdays for North End, West End and Beacon Hill residents from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Community Work Services.
Interested eligible participants should call 617-263-4650 or 617-523-8125 to make a reservation for the weekly lunches. Lunch is offered on a first-come first-served basis to the first 40 participants and staff will waitlist people if necessary. It is advisable to sign up early.