34 Plum Street

At the acute corner of Plum and Chestnut, in the centre of Kingston's Fruit Belt neighbourhood, is a two-storey three-bedroom house wrapped in royal blue steel. The lot's perimeter is marked with bracing fences of caged rock and longitudinal wooden slats. There is both limestone patio and interlocking brick. An arbor against the side of the house, beneath which you set your outdoor dining table, is like the ribcage of a ship. Design-wise, it is downtown's most interesting address. The main floor offers gracious high-ceilinged spaces with pale walls and dark hardwoods, and a separate living and dining room. The kitchen, with its granite counters and glass backsplash, its pebbled chimney and steel accents, is both warm and distinctly modern. There are three good bedrooms and a dreamy bathroom with a Victorian clawfoot tub and ivy climbing around the mirror's frame. There is a parking spot out back beyond the deck, and even a mudroom which would convert nicely into a main-floor bathroom. It is a unique and rather brilliant house in a unique and rather brilliant neighbourhood, just down the street from Friendship Park, and a ten-minute amble from the core's shops and restaurants.