Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 2).
Cottage 2 (Unit 2) is really the public face of Delft Haven; the one home on the quadrangle with a front door that’s actually on Commercial Street. Because there is no parking lot in front, Cottage 2 is always clearly visible, unlike the flanking Cottages 1 and 3. For a two-bedroom unit, it’s remarkably snug, at 505 square feet. But it is handsomely appointed, which I know because its owners, Bill Barr and John Vasconcellos of New Bedford, who are evidently proud and happy to be part of Delft Haven, generously share views of the cottage and the compound under the “Delft Haven” feed on Instagram and Facebook. Ralph Snow Carpenter, the developer of Delft Haven in 1935, would be pleased to see how good it looks 85 years later — if he could get over the fact that the cottage was inhabited by two men married to one another.
Cottage 2 portfolio by Bill Barr
Photographs on Instagram and Facebook.
February 2014, August 2014.
August 2014, August 2015.
August 2015, September 2015.
September 2016.
May 2017, June 2017.
January 2018.
August 2018, October 2018.
October 2018, December 2018.
January 2019, February 2019.
March 2019, April 2019.
April 2019, July 2019.
August 2019, September 2019.
October 2019, November 2019.
February 2020, June 2020.
June 2020, July 2020.
August 2020.
As Cottage 2 was originally apportioned, the 9-by-11-foot bedrooms were at either end of the building, separated by a 13-by-15-foot living room with a fireplace, an 8-by-9-foot kitchen, and a tiny bathroom with shower that doubled as the door to the quadrangle. The main window, made up of 20 small lights, is a marvelous frame for Cottage 6 across the way, and affords its owners front-row seats to the White Party.
When Peter L. Boyle and John J. Boyle made Delft Haven a condominium in 1977, the first buyers of Cottage 2 were two men from Manhattan who paid $43,000 for it (about $180,000 in today’s money). They sold it in 1984 for $91,000 ($230,000) to another Manhattan couple. One of those men, by then the sole owner, sold it in 2013 for $635,000 to Vasconcellos and Barr, who own it as of this writing.
“After the double floods in 2018 we remodeled the house into a one-bedroom, the kitchen now on the west side of the unit where the bedroom was,” Barr told me in 2020. “We saved as much original material as possible, and were sensitive to keeping the charm of the original intact. The bathroom, while remodeled, is in the same place and appointed in a subtle 1930s aesthetic.”
Cottage 2 at Delft Haven in 2016. Photo by David W. Dunlap.
Approaching from the westward. Dunlap, 2008.
Left: The much-photographed weather vane. Right: A single red tulip poked out from behind the topiary in 2008. Both photos by Dunlap.
The cottage, as seen from the beach. Dunlap, 2009.
Originally from California, Barr is a retired interior designer. He sits on the board of the Historic Commission in New Bedford and is active in the community. Design, preservation, and gardening are passions of his, and he belongs to the garden committee at Delft Haven. He’s also responsible for the décor of his own cottage, as well as that of Cottage 6.
Vasconcellos is the president of the SouthCoast Community Foundation, which has directed $41.9 million in private charitable funds toward some 175 art, cultural, educational, and humanitarian programs in a region bounded by Stoughton, Cuttyhunk, North Attleboro, Plymouth. He was formerly a regional director of the Trustees of Reservations, which was instrumental in preserving the Dunes’ Edge Campground, 386 Route 6.
¶ Last updated on 12 September 2020.
7 Commercial Street on the Town Map.
Also at 7 Commercial Street:
Delft Haven II Condominium overview
Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 1)
Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 3)
Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 4)
Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 5)
Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 6)
Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 7 and 8)
Delft Haven II Condominium (Unit 17)
Delft Haven office (Demolished)
Thumbnail image: Photo, 2010, by David W. Dunlap.