TucsonLi f est yl e.com52 Tu c son Li festyle HOME & GARDEN / JUNE 2017

BY ROMI CARRELL WITTMAN | PHOTYOGRAPHY BY THOMAS VENEKLASEN

“Livin g h istory” … in a sense, that’s what Bob Nevins experiences every day.

The University of Arizona College of Architecture professor emeritus resides at Atria Bell Court Gardens, a community on the city’s eastside that offers resort-style independent living for retired seniors. It’s a facility in a historic neighborhood, and the building’s past as a luxurious private home for a wealthy industrialist speaks of some of the influential folks who shaped Tucson in the 1920s.

Those echoes of a gran der era reverberate today, like the bell in the tower that graces the structure. Nevins says the common living room and the library are much the way they were back in their heyday. “The living room is a very lovely place, the library too,” he says. “I like them not so much for the interiors, but for the structure itself. The living room ceiling is quite wonderful, with its original wood beams.”

Nevins, who says he was drawn to the property because of the historical elements, especially enjoys the layout of the community, saying that it’s very

Living Hist ory

ABOVE The living room of Bob Nevins’ apartment holds an eclectic mix of hand-made furniture and art from around the world.LEFT Residents at Atria Bell Court Gardens personalize their spaces by decorating the entrances to their apartments.

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easy to get around, whether through indoor hallways or outdoor passageways. But, he believes the arrangement of the apartments around the courtyard is what truly stands out. “That’s partly due to the architecture,” he adds.

Nevins also appreciates the large apartments with their gener-ous wall space. An avid collector of both Mexican and African art as well as photography, he has ample wall space to display his collections.

One can’t help but wonder about the conversation that would ensue if Nevins were able to sit down with the man for whom the structure was originally built: Charles Augustus Belin. Belin, whose family legacy is intertwined with the DuPonts, was one of the founders of the Aetna Explosives Company. He contracted

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT Built-in shelves hold an extensive collection of books and art; homeowner Bob Nevins; masks, pottery and folk art cover the walls in the master bedroom.

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tuberculosis in the early 1900s, and like many before and after him, moved to the desert to improve his health.

After living in a house he’d built just west of what is now Tucson Medical Center, Belin purchased 175 acres of land from famous novel-ist Harold Bell Wright (The Mine With the Iron Door) and engaged Merritt Starkweather, the architect of the beloved Arizona Inn, to design the house. The Spanish Colonial-style home fea-tured many of the same details that are seen in the famous hotel, as well as a huge living room with 15-foot beamed ceilings, an imposing gran-ite fireplace standing seven feet tall, a bell tower and a lush courtyard surrounding a 25-foot pool inlaid with imported tile. Belin hired European craftsmen to install hand-painted Mexican and Italian tile wall accents, tile and mahogany floors, as well as wrought-iron railings, gates, radiators and even curtain rods throughout the home. The total cost of the project was an astro-nomical $1.3 million, or roughly $17.3 million in today’s dollars.

Belin — who married Rosetta Carson Schwab — a local widow with four children — after moving to Tucson, only lived a few years after the completion of his mansion. Rosetta then sold it and a portion of the acreage to the Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet, who were seeking a larger space for St. Joseph’s Academy. After the move, the school operated for another 37 years before closing in 1969. The property was boarded

TOP Atria Bell Court Gardens’ architecture is reminiscent of an era long past, and is similar in style to the Arizona Inn, also designed by Merritt Starkweather. ABOVE Covered porches provide shady retreats that look out into a lush courtyard.

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RIGHT The original hand-painted Mexican and Italian tile wall accents and mahogany floors were retained in Atria Bell Court’s library. BELOW The large common living room has 15-foot beamed ceilings and a seven-foot-tall granite fireplace.

up and sat vacant for nearly a decade until the Hillhaven Corporation purchased and renovated it in 1978. It became a retirement community named Villa Campana, or “house of the bell,” evoking the bell that rang to call students to mass at the chapel.

The property changed hands again in 1996 and became Atria Bell Court Gardens. “The building was designed as a home and people immediately feel that,” says Deborah Bayze, community sales director at Atria Bell Court Gardens.

The school’s chapel is now an activity room called Academy Hall, where everything from musical performances to lectures take place, while the courtyard and original swimming pool are at the center of more than 140 apartments. Though some things have changed dramatically since Belin’s time, many of the home’s original details — the hand-hewn ceiling beams, beautiful tilework and flooring, the huge granite fireplace — can still be found. And the bell that once called students to chapel still rings every day at noon.

“We’re not cookie cutter,” says Deborah Bayze, a sentiment former architecture professor Nevins most likely would con-cur. She adds that the unique identity of the community is a boon to its residents. “Just because you move to a senior living community, you don’t have to lose your identity or your sense of self.” HG