March 2008
Classics Major
Prim on the outside, anything but on the inside
Social register: among 52 Rosedale Road's gentry-
courting features are a panelled library, luxe
columned dining room and swooping staircase
Image credit: Meaghan Ogilvie
If you’ve never been inside a Rosedale home, chances are the image in your head conforms pretty closely to 52 Rosedale Road. Designed by Mathers & Haldenby, its understatedly regal 1935 façade is such a pure example of Georgian design that architecture profs at U of T take their students to study it. The interior, however, is anything but understated. The owners are Joel Bell, who’s in private equity, and Marifé Hernández, former chief of protocol for the Carter administration and later president of the cultural PR division of Ogilvy & Mather in New York. They bought it in 1999 and, after not using it regularly for years (they spend most of their time in NYC), are now selling for $5.9 million. Done in a modified 18th-century French style, the four-bedroom, seven-bathroom pile features upholstered walls and luxurious drapes, which will strike a potential buyer as either gorgeous or overwhelming, depending on their feelings about Versailles.








