Nantucket Preservation Trust Records New Preservation Easement On Fair Street

Nantucket Preservation Trust (NPT) announced this week that it has recorded a new easement at 23/25 Fair Street, the George Folger House, that dates back to 1837.

A preservation easement is a legal agreement between a property owner and a qualified easement holding organization like the NPT that protects the architectural integrity of a historic property by restricting future alterations and uses.

The preservation easement on the George Folger House will ensure that historical features of the home, including the exterior and exceptionally well-preserved Greek Revival style interior details like its main staircase, moulded window and door frames, fireplaces and wooden mantelpieces, lime plaster walls, and wide plank floorboards, will be preserved in perpetuity. The easement also protects the open space north of the George Folger House at the corner of Fair Street and Charter Street.

On this lot, a Pence School, since moved to Quince Street, once stood.

The NPT stated the preservation easement was the result of the stewardship of Philip Carpenter.

Carpenter’s parents, Mary Grace and Charles Carpenter, Jr., restored the 1837 house after they purchased it in 1963. The Carpenters were avid art collectors, and the experience of restoring the Folger House caused them to turn their collecting interests towards Nantucket’s traditional crafts.

Together, the Carpenters authored The Decorative Arts and Crafts of Nantucket (1987), one of the definitive volumes on the subject.

“As a builder, I appreciate old ways,” said Philip Carpenter. "And I hope to encourage others to follow my path in preserving historic Nantucket.”

A preservation restriction agreement runs with the land, and its protections apply to all future owners in perpetuity. Nantucket Preservation Trust now holds preservation easements on 26 island properties, 11 of which are private homes. The first easement held by NPT was recorded in 1999 on 5 Quince Street by the late Clarissa Porter. Today, NPT maintains the Clarissa Porter Easement Fund, a fund dedicated to NPT’s preservation easement program.

“We were pleased to be able to use some of the Clarissa Porter Fund to reduce the cost of creating a preservation easement for the Folger House. The Carpenter family have been exceptional stewards of the property—and Nantucket’s history. This is the very sort of building the fund was set up to help protect,” said Mary Bergman, NPT’s executive director.