COLD SPRING — Cold Spring just isn’t big enough. The perfect location between the busy places and the wild nooks, the section of Lower Township passes by in a blink as one drives south along Seashore Road to West Cape May.
The remains of old farms and even older forests make a patchwork that occasionally offers glimpses of salt marsh meadows in the protected enclosures of the Cape Island Wildlife Management Area, which wraps the town in birdsong like the fog wraps around Brigadoon.
With so much natural beauty within walking distance, this has become a home for the kind of mismatched couples that used to abound all over the cape: one likes the quiet life, up at dawn, in bed by 9 … and the other wants to gallivant around the islands, dancing through Jazz Fest until morning or brunching and shopping with friends at the boutiques along the way.
The reason so many people held onto their homes during so many ups and downs is because in Cold Spring, everyone could have what they wanted and enjoy the views at every turning.
Now one of the landmark shops that has welcomed people cruising down Seashore Road is up for sale, and the opportunity is ripe for some new owners to keep the Cold Spring spirit going for another quarter-century.
Treehouse Antiques at 742 Seashore Road is much more than just a cool shop and a pretty home: it’s a signpost along the route that signals you’ve arrived in the charming hamlet of Cold Spring.
Historic Cold Spring Village is just south of this buttercup-yellow two-story, offering neighborhood gathering spots and a brewery as well as the enviably beautiful holiday celebrations.
Lower Cape May Regional High School is carefully screened by trees. But Treehouse, as it has been known for 25 years, is its own draw — its own landmark.
The gardens that surround this commercial property, and its hidden parking lot, were designed as part of a former nursery, and it’s easy to see how influential the mix of perennials and natives became as the years have passed.
Tall trees and flowering shrubs form a loose enclosure around the entrance and parking, framing the building. The doorways are enhanced with welcoming porches that spill over with flowers and displays.
Once inside, the interior space has always drawn gasps: tall ceilings, huge display windows welcoming morning light as well as all the news of the neighborhood passing by, pristine wood floors to better show off the luxurious carpets and delicately carved wood antiques.
The lighting has always been a mix of practical and showroom finds, but there’s plenty of it, as well as the emphasis on natural light that makes stopping by such a pleasure.
In fact, the entire property has always shown complete mastery of that rarest of commodities: when driving past, it drew the eye so naturally that by the time one saw the sign and realized it was a commercial space and one absolutely could go in and see more, the desire to walk around this lovely picture was too strong to be ignored.
The number of sudden U-turns on Seashore Road when this antique shop first opened was a running joke among locals. It’s still a sign of summer.
Aside from that inestimable quality, the building itself has two stories that are zoned for two commercial entities or one store and a residence above. The second floor has both a private staircase from the lower shop and an entrance outside that leads to a large sundeck before the main entrance.
The reputation and lore about this place are unlike any other antiques shop in the county — possibly on the East Coast. Rumor has it a brooch belonging to Empress Josephine (wife of Napoleon) once turned up there, purchased for a few dollars by a dealer working with the owners until it was discovered by one of the current owners, to be a priceless piece of history.
Similarly, fireplaces, friezes, art and tableware pulled out of historic mansions slated for demolition far to the north or south of the cape find their way there, drawing an eclectic group of repeat customers who plan their trips around the place.
That’s not even getting into the legends of haunted tables or be-spirited bedsteads that arrive there for their time in the spotlight (sometimes an actual spotlight, to highlight rare wood grain or delicate craftsmanship) before heading home with an appreciative new caretaker.
Of course, one can’t hoard treasures in a building where the roof leaks or the temperature varies too much, so the entire structure has been maintained and updated along the way to protect the one-of-a-kind stock within. This has been helped along by solar panels and central air conditioning, as well as individual units to keep the air just right.
Treehouse Antiques sits on a lot that is almost a half-acre in size, filled with the aforementioned gardens, a pond, outbuildings, little patios on which to sit outside and enjoy the surrounding loveliness, and a crushed-stone parking lot described as “large.”
A small building that used to be a carriage house but has since been upgraded to a showplace with a vaulted ceiling and a fireplace is just behind the main building. The property offers so much, but quite a lot of information is for serious interest only. To find out anything in more detail, it’s clear one has to contact the listing agent and schedule a look at this unmatched location.
