8 REMB THE NEW YORK TIMES, SUNDAY, AUGUST 9, 2020Lauren Rogala and Michael Druce, like so
many others, started working from home in
mid-March. For Ms. Rogala, home was a
large one-bedroom in a walk-up in the West
70s. Mr. Druce lived with a roommate in
Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn.
The couple, who met late last year at a
photo shoot — she’s the art director for the
fashion brand M. M. LaFleur, he’s a photog-
rapher at the Line Studios — had no idea
how long the stay-at-home order would last.
“We had come to a crossroads,” said Mr.
Druce, 22. “Do we do this thing separately
or do we do this thing together? It was a no-
brainer that we were going to do this togeth-
er, at her place.”
Her place, however, was just a stopgap. “I
loved my apartment,” said Ms. Rogala, 28.
“It had a dishwasher, and they allowed out-
of-state guarantors, which is a hard thing to
come by. It was an oasis, but when you’re
confined there, it becomes a little suffocat-
ing.” The rent was around $2,800 a month.
The time had come to find a bigger place
for the both of them. They wanted either a
two-bedroom that would encourage their
families to stay over, or a one-bedroom with
outdoor space where they could breathe
fresh air without wearing a mask.
“I wanted to start a new chapter with Mi-
chael and have the place be ours and feel it
was something we were building together,”
Ms. Rogala said.
They preferred a small walk-up building
in the West 70s or 80s with prewar charm. It
had to have a dishwasher. “Once you have a
dishwasher, you can never go back,” said
Ms. Rogala, who has food allergies and pre-
pares every meal at home.
Ms. Rogala always asked about protocols
for touring the apartments safely; every-
one wore a mask. “The agents would meet
me in front of the building, and we would
swap rooms, or they would stay in the
kitchen and when I went into the kitchen
they would go into the hallway,” she said.
Her rental faced the back of the building,
so she knew that outdoor space would most
likely come with a rear apartment. Their
price range was up to $3,500 a month.
Among their options:
1.ONE-BEDROOM WITH LOFTS
This one-bedroom had a living room with
high ceilings, a huge window and an ex-
posed brick wall, and two loft spaces with
low ceilings, each up a flight of stairs. The
rent was $3,400.2.ONE-BEDROOM WITH TERRACE
This one-bedroom had 12-foot ceilings and
plenty of prewar detail, including original
moldings, and an outdoor terrace with wood
floors bordered by a latticed fence. The rent
was $3,100.3.TWO-BEDROOM WITH BIG KITCHEN
This two-bedroom had a long entry hallway
and a large kitchen with a peninsula in one
corner of the living room. The bedrooms
were amply sized. The rent was $3,450.THEIR CHOICE
The one-bedroom with two lofts had a lot of
floor space. The departing tenant had the
lofts set up as living spaces, but the low ceil-
ings made it impossible to stand up straight.
The price later dropped to $3,100.
The two-bedroom was enticing, with the
spare bedroom good for guests or working.
But in the end, the couple decided that out-
door space was more valuable to them than
an extra bedroom.
Mr. Druce was in Florida for work
through much of June, so Ms. Rogala saw
the one-bedroom with the terrace on her
own. She gave him a tour via FaceTime.
“I talked to Michael for hours about how
lovely I thought it was,” she said. “It felt like
home. It felt like us.”
This apartment was not on the top floor,
making the terrace a rare find. “Most
brownstones have an extension in the back,
and in this case the extension wasn’t the full
height of the building,” said John Downey,
the listing agent. “This outdoor space was
the roof of the extension.”
To check the light and noise, Ms. Rogala
visited twice more, “which you never get to
do under normal circumstances,” she said.
Mr. Druce agreed to take the apartment
sight unseen. The two negotiated the rent to
$3,000, paid a broker’s fee of one month’s
rent and arrived in late June.
“We downsized a bit on the interior space,
specifically the living room and the closet
space,” Mr. Druce said.
But the trade off for outdoor space has
been worth it. They furnished their terrace
and added a trellis and flowerpots. Now it’s
their “outdoor living area and hangout
spot,” Mr. Druce said.
“When the weather is nice, we spend as
much time as we can outside,” he said. “We
are using the terrace as an extension of the
living room.”The Hunt
Their Decision Came Down to Outdoor Space Versus an Extra Bedroom
A couple sought an apartment
on the Upper West Side in the
midst of the pandemic.
There was plenty of floor
space in a one-bedroom
that had two loft spaces with
low ceilings, each up a flight of
stairs.An important feature in a
one-bedroom with 12-foot
ceilings was an outdoor
terrace with wood floors
bordered by a latticed fence.An apartment with two
nicely sized bedrooms also
had a large kitchen with a
peninsula in a corner of the
living room.‘I wanted to start a new chapter with Michael and have the place be ours
and feel it was something we were building together,’ Ms. Rogala says.
PHOTOGRAPHS BY KATHERINE MARKS FOR THE NEW YORK TIMESBy JOYCE COHEN[email protected]1 23The RentersMichael Druce and Lauren Rogala in their new apartment in Manhattan.The OptionsAUCTION
SEPTEMBER 30
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