A rose by another name
Historic Rosebriar Mansion
reopens as Airbnb rental
BY NIKKI DAVIDSON
A
fter years of quiet, the historic man-
sion that sits at 14th Street and Frank-
lin Avenue in Astoria is buzzing again
with weekend activity.
The big white house has withstood many
lives in its nearly 120 years. Originally a per-
sonal home for Frank Patton, one of Astoria’s
early successful businessmen, it transformed
into a convent in the 50s, then a hotel in the
90s, followed by an addiction treatment cen-
ter for women in 2009.
Now, it will be a hybrid space that incor-
porates much of the past in a brand new way.
New owners Djordje and Trudy Čitović
and their kids plan to live in half of the home.
The couple has begun renting out the other
half of the mansion as an airbnb or event
space for large groups.
The Čitovićs beamed with excitement
while showing off the new common space
for airbnb guests, a restored chapel, lined
with stained-glass windows and antique fur-
niture—lit by computerized color-changing
LED lights. It’s just one testament to how far
they’ve come in their mission to meld the old
with the new inside an aging giant.
The pair acknowledge that restoration of
the 8,700 square foot, two-story home and
carriage house has been a wild ride. Their
journey is a rollercoaster of ups and downs
that started before the deal on the property
was fi nalized.
Nikki Davidson
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
The newly renovated chapel inside the Rosebriar Mansion.
Behind the scenes
See videos and pictures of the Rosebriar
Mansion renovation process on Instagram:
@RosebriarMansion
If You Go
636 14th St, Astoria
info@rosebriarmansion.com
rosebriarmansion.com
A refi nished bedroom in a space that used to
be part of the convent.
A leaking toilet created a massive hole in
the chapel ceiling during the renovation
process.
above the chapel the day before. What had
seemed like a minor problem at the time
was suddenly like a Tom Hanks scene in the
movie “The Money Pit.”
“The drywall was just holding water so I
punched it to release it, and there was proba-
bly like a 10-foot hole in the ceiling,” laughed
Djordje. “And then sure enough, the real
restate agent walks in. I said ‘I take full respon-
sibility, we’re still buying the place,’ and she
just turns around and says ‘I wasn’t here.’”
The mansion needed a lot of work. The
Čitovićs also discovered a puzzling electri-
cal mess from years of renovations, and a bat
Hailey Hoff man/The Astorian
Digging into the past
The day the papers to purchase the prop-
erty were signed, Djordje opened the door
of the old chapel to fi nd water. More than an
inch of water settling into the fl oor, and drip-
ping down the walls. The drywall ceiling was
dramatically sagging under the weight of a
massive leak.
He recalled working on a toilet that
wouldn’t stop running in the room directly
Djordje Čitović discovered the original
wallpaper when stripping down the walls of
the mansion.
in the attic.
“There was a women’s rehabilitation
center here for 10 years, and unfortunately
they didn’t take great care of it,” said Trudy.
“They painted the walls lime green. I would
say that the spirit of it was there, but it was it
was tarnished.”
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