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List Price: $799,000
The Property: There’s a pretty street view framed by the long rectangular porch of this Prairie-style house built in 1908 in the Sheridan Park section of Uptown. Inside the living room, there is another framed landscape view: a mural of woods and a mountain meadow that’s set into the mahogany beams above the brick mantel.

The unsigned mural is a classic Arts and Crafts touch designed to imbue the house with nature. A similar effect comes from the earth-toned bricks used to build the mantel and the home’s exterior, where the mortar is brushed back for a handmade look.

The home, whose history and architect aren’t known, has many vintage details in the main rooms of its first floor, as you will see in today’s video. The hallway has two gorgeous original lamps—green and gold glass with pendant bulbs—as well as a bench at the rear where the early owners of the house could sit and talk on a telephone, which a servant would have handed them through a small window. A music room has a brass chandelier and wall sconces with lyres emblazoned on them and a delicate pattern of droplets in the stained glass.

Beamed ceilings cover the hallway and living and dining rooms; in the latter, they are stenciled with a geometric flower pattern. The dining room also has built-in china cabinets (with stained-glass doors and the original interior mirrors) crowned by an arched stained-glass window above. That’s outdone only by the stained-glass installation over the main stairs. (Some of the interiors of the home were recently used in the filming of Scrooge & Marley, a gay updating of the Dickens Christmas story.)

All these features were still in place—although the rest of the house was in otherwise shabby condition—in 1985, when Dick Uyvari and Joe LaPat bought it. The two men also renovated several other homes in the neighborhood, including an Arts and Crafts three-flat next door that is for sale.

In today’s property, much of the house was still unrenovated when LaPat died in 2008. That includes the eight bedrooms on the upper two floors and the main-floor kitchen, which needs updating and expanding. Some of the large back porch could be cannibalized for that purpose. The list price could make that rehabbing more feasible. From the limestone torch at the peak of the home’s façade to the copious stained glass inside, “all the irreplaceable pieces are still here,” says Andy Gersten, the agent for the property.

Price Points: The house had been on the market for about a year, with an initial asking price of $985,000. Two weeks ago, the seller’s mortgage lender approved a short sale, in which Uyvari will sell for less than he owes on the mortgage. “The lender wants this to happen,” Gersten says. “They’ve given me guidance on the pricing, and they think it’s where it will sell.”

Listing Agent: Andy Gersten of Prudential Rubloff; 312-368-3280 or agersten@rubloff.com