Dutchtown dilemma: Stillwater residents appeal ‘McMansion’ in historic neighborhood

Mary Divine, Pioneer Press
·9 min read

The Dutchtown neighborhood north of downtown Stillwater is one of the city’s oldest and funkiest settlements.

Founded in 1854 as a “company town” for lumber-mill employees, the neighborhood features narrow, winding streets, modest gabled houses and steep hills.

“There are very few areas like it,” said historian Don Empson, the author of “A History of the Dutchtown Residential Area.”

Empson and others are worried that a Stillwater couple’s plan to build a single-family house on a vacant lot at the southwest corner of First Street North and Willow Street would undermine the charm of the historic neighborhood.

The proposed 2,800-square-foot home “doesn’t fit the scale and character of the neighboring houses,” Empson said. “It’s like putting a hotel between a couple of bungalows. The size is way too large, and it’s a French Second Empire style with a mansard roof. It is completely out of order in every way.”

The city’s heritage preservation commission in January approved the design of the house at 1824 First St. N. with conditions, but neighbors appealed the decision to the Stillwater City Council. The council on Tuesday will vote on whether to uphold the appeal — which would deny the current project — or uphold the commission’s approval with conditions.

Designing a house to fit

Ryan and Andrea Rambacher, who have two young children, bought the vacant lot in April 2022. According to county property records, they paid $140,000 for the property. A house on the site was destroyed by fire in 2013 and demolished. The family moved to Stillwater in May 2017.

“We bought the lot because we love the quiet neighborhood feel, and we wanted to be close to downtown,” Ryan Rambacher said. “We love the historic nature of the houses in Stillwater. We live in one, but the one we live in is too big — it’s 5,700 square feet. We want a smaller house with less maintenance.”

Designing a house to fit on the lot, however, proved difficult. The lot is small and narrow — approximately 50 feet by 150 feet — and is on a steep hill.

After a preliminary meeting with the city’s heritage preservation commission and planning commission, the Rambachers made a number of changes to their original plans. Among the architectural edits: reducing the three-stall garage to a two-stall garage, and moving the garage to the back of the home instead of tucking it under, Ryan Rambacher said.

Dutchtown is part of a neighborhood conservation overlay district, said Tim Gladhill, Stillwater’s community development director. Concerned about new buildings that might not fit with the city’s historic character, Stillwater officials in 2013 adopted a set of design guidelines for the city’s older residential neighborhoods, he said.

Under the guidelines, any proposed alterations should conform to the “neighborhood street rhythm,” and the height, scale, mass and proportion of the proposed alterations, including roof style, should be compatible with the site and its surroundings.

According to the guidelines, buildings may be only 35 feet tall, cover 25 percent of the lot and be 2½ stories or shorter, Gladhill said.

Due to the steepness of Rambachers’ lot and the fact that the front of the house faces First Street, “it caused the basement of the house, which would normally be covered by dirt, to be considered one story,” Ryan Rambacher said. “Instead of a two-story house with a walkout basement, the city considered it a three-story house.”

Based on advice from city officials, the Rambachers turned the top level of the house into a half-story, which is allowed under the design guidelines, he said.

“We had to come up with a solution that maximized square footage, but we weren’t able to make the main level any larger due to regulations not allowing structures larger than 25 percent of the lot,” Rambacher said. “Additionally, we had to minimize the roof’s peak, so it wouldn’t block the river view of our neighbors behind us.”

The solution was to locate the half-story in a mansard roof, Rambacher said.

But Melanie Ebertz, who lives down the block, said the mass and the roof line of the proposed house don’t fit the neighborhood. She is one of eight neighbors who paid the $250 fee to appeal the heritage preservation commission’s decision.

“The mansard roof of the proposed structure is completely incompatible with those in the neighborhood, which are almost all gabled,” they wrote in their Jan. 27 appeal.

If the Stillwater City Council approves the Rambachers’ design, “it will take the commitment out of a lot of people to preserve this area,” Ebertz said in an interview last week.

Several of the neighborhood’s original German homes still remain, including Ebertz’s tidy white 1860s home, complete with restored outbuildings, barn, wagon house and three-hole outhouse. Ebertz bought the house from longtime Dutchtown resident Louise Berg in 1998; Berg’s grandfather, Johann Berg, bought it in 1881.

“Stillwater is really ripe for a Dutchtown revival,” Ebertz said. “The Brown’s Creek (State) Trail cuts right through Dutchtown, and, really, all eyes are on Dutchtown. The amount of people who are out exploring Dutchtown by biking and walking is awesome. It’s time to decide: Does the city care about Dutchtown, or don’t they?”

A Dutchtown full of Germans

According to Empson, two German businessmen, Adolphus Boeckeler and Frederick Schulenburg, built a lumber mill on the St. Croix River at the base of East Sycamore Street, about a mile north of downtown Stillwater, in 1853. A year later, they purchased lots on several nearby blocks, and the area was soon filled with German immigrants. By 1880, outsiders were calling the area “Deutschetown,” a name that soon was corrupted to “Dutchtown,” Empson said.

“It was a company town in that the company owned most of the property and built most of the houses,” he said. “But it wasn’t only a company town; it was an isolated company town. They were German immigrants, and they hired other German immigrants, so everyone spoke German.”

Dutchtown continues to provide much-needed affordable housing in Stillwater, said Daniel Kalmon, who has lived in the neighborhood since 1995.

“These were all laborer homes. This was the working-class part of town,” he said. “When I moved here in 1995, there were still three places using outhouses actively. The neighborhood had no sewer or water. It was the part of town that had never been touched by the city.”

The proposed new house “is significantly different from anything else in that neighborhood,” Kalmon said. “I think we have to look at the housing stock that we have in the community and try to keep it in place if we can. We’re just in a real crisis when it comes to affordable housing. If you keep flipping over lots, ultimately, taxes go up, and people are priced out. I think this neighborhood has a lot of value. The community is really strong, and I think we should be working to preserve it.”

Would a ‘McMansion’ affect taxes?

Neighbors say they’re not opposed to developing the vacant lot, they just want a compatible home there.

“There has to be a place in Stillwater for people with moderate incomes to live, and Dutchtown has been that place,” Empson said. “Taxes are based on comparable properties. Building this McMansion would raise everybody’s taxes, and then you build a couple more, and many people won’t be able to afford to live there anymore. Stillwater needs more affordable housing — and in general, the old houses are the more affordable housing.”

The neighbors would like to see a house built on the empty lot “because it’s really sad there right now,” Ebertz said. “We would love another house on Willow Street, but it needs to fit, and a gable roof fits. It’s all about the scale and roof line. It needs to respect the city’s guidelines. This work has already been done, and it was done because (city officials) anticipated this coming. … That’s why we feel hopeful that we can have a compatible build there in our neighborhood.”

City officials are fielding more requests for “infill” development each year, Gladhill said.

“Every case is going to be different,” he said. “Our first goal is to attempt to preserve over replace, and so we have a very robust demolition ordinance that really aims to preserve existing structures and work to repair them versus demolish and replace. We’ve seen a good mix of really good, high-quality homes that blend in well with the surrounding neighborhood, and we’ve seen some that aren’t so great.”

In the Rambachers’ case, city officials are still working “to make a determination as to how compatible it is,” he said.

“We were concerned about height, scale and massing, and we’re trying to figure out what is that balance of fitting in new construction in a historic neighborhood. We think that the applicant is working hard to get there. We don’t know if we’ve reduced the scale and mass to the point of being compatible. That’s what this next process will help us understand.”

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The Rambachers say they have abided by all the guidance and recommendations provided by the HPC while still staying in line with city requirements, and they hope the Stillwater City Council will recognize that on Tuesday.

“The house presented today looks very different from when we first met with the HPC due to their recommendations,” Ryan Rambacher said. “We have done everything they have asked us to do. … It’s just a shame. We are good people, just trying to build a home for our family. The kids have already picked out the paint for their bedrooms.”

It will be up to the Stillwater City Council to decide Dutchtown’s fate, Empson said.

“I was gobsmacked by what the HPC did in allowing a house of this magnitude in this historic area,” he said. “The HPC is charged with integrating new housing into old neighborhoods and this proposed house doesn’t do that. … Is the city going to take steps to preserve an historic neighborhood, or do McMansions rule?”