Enhancing the beauty and preserving the past in Reedville

by Jackie Nunnery

The Northern Neck has been embracing and refurbishing its collection of picturesque Main Streets.

While many are devoted to dining or shopping, traveling down Reedville’s Main Street is an opportunity to view historic and architecturally distinctive homes, a testament to the great prosperity brought about by a small fish: the menhaden.

Situated among some of the famously grand Queen Anne Victorians of Millionaire’s Row, the ongoing revival and reimagining of another, the Winifred Winston House, already has neighbors excited.

Not that there was anything wrong with “Queen Winnie,” as owners Michael Manyak and Angelina DeRosa Manyak call her. Though needing upkeep and repair as any home would need after over 100 years of withstanding elements and human habitation, “we saw it and instantly fell in love,” DeRosa Manyak said as a 12-man painting crew from Parlett Painting of Gloucester were busy climbing, scraping, patching and painting the complex patterns of color during a 10-day process.

Just how complex is the color scheme? “There’s eight colors, no wait, nine, maybe 10?” she says, laughing and counting on her fingers….