What was once a pleasant Cape Cod-style home in Grosse Pointe that fell into disrepair today blends state-of-the-art technology with the history and modern businesses of the Fruehauf and Buhl families.
August Fruehauf, a Detroit blacksmith, was commissioned in 1918 to build a trailer that could tow a boat behind a Ford Model T. His company went on to produce thousands of heavy-duty semitrailers for use around the world before being sold in 1989.
The Buhl family owned a successful stamping business, constructed the Buhl Building in downtown Detroit, and launched Buhl Aircraft Co. in 1925. The latter built the Buhl-Verville CA-3 Airster, which featured folding wings, carried passengers and light cargo, and was used for aerial photography.
From the first floor of the restored home, H. Richard Fruehauf oversees Master Key Energy, an oil and gas business, while his son, Kenneth A. Fruehauf, is managing director of Legacy Wealth Management Group of Wells Fargo Advisors. Thomas C. Buhl is Legacy Wealth’s first vice president for investments.
Architect Jamie Mertz, principal of Mertz Design in Grosse Pointe, managed the renovation. He began by stripping the interior and exterior of the 88-year-old structure. “One more step and it could have been a vacant lot,” Mertz says, explaining how deep into the building’s structure the six-month project delved.
Mertz added a new roof, a garage, a central staircase, and custom fittings for file cabinets, flat-screen wall monitors, and bookshelves. There’s also new wall, door, and window trim. The exterior was sheathed in a man-made product that mimics cedar shake shingles.
While Mertz and Connell Building Co. in St. Clair Shores worked on the infrastructure, interior designers Libby Follis and Drew Ebbing, with Gifted Interiors in Grosse Pointe, carried out the two families’ wishes for furnishings and decoration.
Ken Fruehauf says the design duo had many outside-the-box ideas and executed them with one thought in mind. “We didn’t want a standard office space,” he says. “We wanted something somewhat homey and comfortable.”
The makeover reflects the Fruehauf and Buhl families’ deep Detroit roots as well as nearby Lake St. Clair, the energy and wealth management businesses, and trips to Africa.
On the main floor, in the bathroom off Richard Fruehauf’s office, African masks and spears hang on sisal wallpaper. The vanity is a three-drawer dresser covered in an animal print. His wife’s office also has an African theme, with a sisal rug, an animal print side chair, and photos.
There is Fruehauf memorabilia throughout the building — some of it rescued by Richard Fruehauf’s longtime personal assistant, Elizabeth Notarangelo. Items include old magazine advertisements, a stock certificate, photos of August Fruehauf standing outside his Gratiot Avenue shop, family portraits, model trucks, nameplates from trucks and trailers, and even copies of a painting by Zoltan Sepeshy, former director of the Cranbrook Academy of Art, showing a Ford truck, a Fruehauf trailer, and the Ambassador Bridge.
The Buhl memorabilia includes a stock certificate and several advertisements for Buhl Aircraft Co. “These are the things Ken would hand us and say, ‘Find a place for it,’ ” Follis says, grinning.
She and Ebbing discovered many of the furnishings at the Michigan Design Center in Troy and Chicago’s Merchandise Mart. They also commissioned Sterling Heights artist Mario Isenmann to craft custom metalwork and signage, while St. Clair Shores artist Todd Tyrrell created framed tortoise and hare pen-and-ink drawings.
For the second-floor waiting area, Follis and Ebbing papered the walls with a mural based on a 19th-century Detroit street map from Great Wall in Ferndale. A 1927 stock ticker — one of Ken Fruehauf’s requested items — rests on a nearby table.
His office includes a new coffered ceiling and faux rivet wallpaper. The triangular bill of a large, rare sawfish rests on a table near his desk, while a custom upholstered bench with updated tree-of-life fabric replaces several chairs at the conference table.
A separate second-floor conference room has a nautical theme: tall-ship chandelier, an antique periscope, and pictures of yachts sailing on the water.
“It was a project that ebbed and flowed as we melded the family histories with the early days of Detroit,” Follis says. “If we had to do it again, we wouldn’t change a thing.” db
