U-shaped home is black and white and bathed in light

Tony and Susie Pohl’s home has 114 windows and is U-shaped, which gives them unique views from every direction.

When you look at the front of their mid-century modern home, you can see straight through the upper part of their home and into their large backyard. And from their master bedroom, you can look through a wall of windows onto the patio, then through their family room and into their side yard.

It’s definitely not a home one would feel claustrophobic in.

“You can see outside from any room, and you get used to a lot of light,” said Tony. “It feels like you’re outdoors when you’re indoors. In other styles of houses I feel you don’t see much.”

Susie said that in addition to all the light, their windows also let in bursts of color.

“In fall when the leaves on the maple trees in our front yard change colors and the sun hits them, their colors show on the glass at the front of the house,” she said. “When people walk by and see this, they stop and look.”

The couple, who bought the 2,200-square-foot home in 1999 in Glendale after living in a Brown Deer condo, said that what they loved most was all the light. But its unique interior was also a draw.

Susie said that every room in the house has beams on the ceiling. They have a sunken living room with a large wood fireplace made of the same brick that is used to accent the home’s exterior. And that nearly the entire home was done in white and black.

Because of the U shape, it also has long hallways. There’s a 50-foot hallway that connects the home’s three bedrooms and two of the bathrooms to the rest of the house, and a 30-foot hallway that runs across the front of the house and connects the bedroom hallway to the kitchen, living room and family room.

Tony said that if you want to go from the family room to the master bedroom — which is at the opposite end of the house — you have to walk down 80 feet of hallway, which “is good exercise.”

Despite the fact that the home was built in 1962, few changes have been made.

Tony said that the previous owner — who built the home — removed a wall that divided the family room from the eating area. He also added a gas fireplace in the family room that is surrounded by a large black wood cabinet that hides the TV and provides storage space. The cabinet perfectly matches the black wood cabinets in their kitchen and throughout the rest of the house.

The Pohls also made some changes after they moved in.

They turned a half bath off the kitchen into a full bath, added black and white tile in the kitchen, as the home’s original linoleum was in bad shape, and replaced white Formica kitchen countertops with granite.

He is an electrical engineer and owns Automation Service & Design Inc. in Mequon. She is the owner of Susie Q’s Inc., a cleaning service she runs out of their home.

Their home, which was built by the late H. Carl Schulze, who had a business in Menomonee Falls, will be featured in this year’s Spaces & Traces tour on May 13.  

The couple recently talked about their home and how unique it is.

Q: What are some of the home’s other amenities?

Tony: Between the living room and the kitchen there are two columns made of plastic that are trimmed with wood, and they light up. The living room has a vaulted ceiling, which is why you can see the backyard from the front of the house.

We also have a circular driveway, a detached two-car garage and large overhangs on the house. The overhangs are so large you can stand out there in the rain and not get wet.

Susie: In the master (bedroom) there is also a whole wall of closets, and one wall in the hallway to the bedrooms has all closets. The hallway cabinets are in a lighter wood, and they have pulls in an Asian design that match the pulls in the bedroom cabinets, which are painted black.

Q: How did you furnish your home after you bought it?

Susie: The previous owners left most of the living room furniture. We only had to buy one chair. The sofa is very long and it’s an off-white tone-on-tone fabric and it sits on a black wood frame. The frame extends on each side to make end tables that are topped with black granite.

They also left a chair with a thin and high back and two matching side chairs. The side chairs were originally a black print but they now look brown because the sun comes in so much that both chairs completely faded. They are now a dark brown color.

Tony: When we bought other pieces, we just bought what we liked. But I like things very simple. I don’t like any clutter at all.

Q: Nearly every exterior wall on your home is covered with custom vertical blinds. Where did you get them?

Susie: The previous owners left them. They are all very similar.

Q: Is the carpeting original?

Tony: The off-white carpeting in the living room and the blue carpeting in the family room are original. We did take out beige carpeting in the bedrooms but replaced it with carpeting in the same color. We also added area rugs in some rooms.

Q: Is the wallpaper in your home original?

Susie: Yes. There is wallpaper on a wall off the kitchen and on a wall in the living room. Both are done in Asian floral designs.

Q: How many bedrooms do you have and how do you use them?

Susie: We have three. One is my office now, one is the master and one is a guest room for our three grandchildren: Graham, 3, Mikayla, 3, and Leal, 1. We have two daughters.

Q: How did you update the half-bath off the kitchen?

Tony: You could access that bath from two directions. One was from a hallway near the side door. I closed off that hallway and put a shower in that space. I added shelving where the door was.

Q: How would you describe the front of your home?

Susie: In the center we have large double doors that Tony painted red. There are large windows on each side of the door and on a vaulted area above it. When you come in the front door there is the long hallway. The wall in that hallway is the back side of the fireplace in the living room. That hallway floor, and the hallway floor that leads to the bedrooms, are both done in black slate.

Q: How would you describe the two bathrooms in the area where your bedrooms are?

Susie: They connect to each other, but there is also a sliding door that separates them. You can access one from the master and the other from the hallway. The bathroom you access from the hallway has a large shower and a toilet, but no sink. The one you access from the master has a vanity with two sinks, a toilet room, a shower and a large cabinet.

Q: Did you make any changes to your landscaping?

Susie: When we first moved here, there was gravel all around the perimeter of the house. We removed all of it so that we could put flowers there.

Tony: We also removed a concrete patio off the family room and took down seven large trees because we didn’t want them falling on the house.

If you go

Spaces & Traces Featuring Glendale: From 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. May 13. Tour 8 homes (1 is an exterior only) and eight commercial properties. 

The tour is presented by Historic Milwaukee Inc. Tickets are $20 for HMI members, non-members pay $25, and volunteers pay $10. Tickets are available online at historicmilwaukee.org, at Milwaukee-area Colectivo locations and at Winkie’s Toys & Variety store in Whitefish Bay. 

There are two event headquarters, where tour booklets can be picked up. They are the Bavarian Bierhaus, 700 W. Lexington Blvd., Glendale, where historian John Gurda will give a lecture at 10 a.m. The second location is Glendale City Hall, 5909 N. Milwaukee River Parkway, where Matt Amman and Eric Strande will give a presentation at 2 p.m. titled “Mid-Century Modern Milwaukee.”

For more information see the website or call (414) 277-7795.

Do you, or does someone you know, have a cool, funky or exquisite living space that you’d like to see featured in At Home? Contact Fresh home and garden editor Nancy Stohs at (414) 224-2382 or email nstohs@journalsentinel.com.