KC Art Institute looks to buy 113-year-old mansion that brothers fought to demolish
In the heart of Kansas City, a 113-year-old historic manor — the $1.3 million family home of two brothers who have long looked to raze to the ground their brick house with its Corinthian white pillars, ornamental plaster ceilings and sweeping staircase — may have a new fate, as it has an interested buyer.
On Monday, a spokesperson for the nearby Kansas City Art Institute confirmed its interest in purchasing what is known as the 7,400-square foot George B. Richards home. Built in 1913 for the wealthy owner of the Richards & Conover Hardware Co., it has for the last 65 years been owned by members of the Vawter family.
Art Institute interest in historic KC mansion
“We really can’t say anything about it yet,” an Art Institute spokesman said on the home’s rumored purchase. “Nothing is finalized or anything like that. I think all that I can really say is just that, yes, we’ve shown interest in the property, but we can’t really say anything more at this time.”
Brothers Steve and Matt Vawter did not return The Star’s attempt to reach them by phone or email.
“I’m sorry, but the Vawters and I are not at liberty to discuss this matter,” their real estate broker, Whitney Kerr, Sr., wrote in an email.
Sale of the property, located at 4526 Warwick Blvd. in Kansas City’s Southmoreland neighborhood, does not appear on the MLS, the multiple listing service run by the National Association of Realtors. Private sales, also known as off-market sales, do not generally appear on the listing service. County records don’t immediately reflect sales.
“They’re looking to purchase it, if they haven’t already completed the sale,” Laura Burkhalter, a former board member of the Southmoreland Neighborhood Association, said of the Art Institute. The neighborhood group has fought against the proposed demolition of the home since 2023.
A current board member of Midtown KC Now, Burkhalter said the midtown neighborhood group has been in close contact with the Art Institute on its “Arterie” project, a walkable corridor that connects the Art Institute’s campus to the nearby Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, located just to the east. Purchase of the home, or the use of its property, is believed to be part of the Institute’s long-term plan.
“They knew that I was interested in what was going on with that house and their overall plan,” Burkhalter said. “I think it’s a good thing they’re going to buy it, and there’s some closure with that.”
Fate of the house still in question
Should a sale be confirmed, the question still remains whether the Art Institute will save the house, renovate and adapt it for a new use, or tear it down to use the property for another purpose.
In 2003, the Art Institute took another historic mansion — a 1908 Georgian Revival at 4538 Warwick Blvd., located next door to the Richards mansion, and designed by architect Adriance Van Brunt — and transformed it into the Jannes Library.
Ever since 2023, Richard and Matthew Vawter have been involved in a neighborhood saga and City Hall battle surrounding their family home, which they inherited in 2020, following the death of their mother, Susie Vawter
The house has sat empty since 2021.
According to the brothers, the home — despite appearing quite elegant, with its portico, white balustrade, five bedrooms, carved fireplaces and a music room — has long been in decay and would cost millions of dollars to restore. It’s nearly one-acre property, they have said, is worth more than the house that sits on it.
‘For Sale’ sign ignited controversy
Controversy ignited in May 2023, when a “For Sale” sign appeared on the home’s sloping front lawn suggesting that the property could be used for a future “high rise” development. The asking price, at the time, was $2.5 million.
The Vawters noted that the home, which overlooks Southmoreland Park to the west, the locale of the annual summer Shakespeare in the Park festival, is the only single-family home remaining on that west side of the park. The home is bordered on the west by the All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church and the Simpson House event space. The Jannes Library sits next door to the south, along with two high-rise apartment buildings, including the 12-story Oak Hall Condominiums.
The Vawters argued that, as private owners, they had to right to do what they wished with their home, and that tearing it down for possible apartment development would not disrupt the neighborhood, even though their particular property is zoned for a single, residential home. The Vawters planned to seek rezoning.
Aghast at the potential loss of an historic home, the Southmoreland Neighborhood Association took the unprecedented move of going against the wishes of a private homeowner and successfully getting the Vawters’ house placed on the Kansas City Register of Historic Places, thus protecting it from demolition pending approval from the city’s Historic Preservation Commission.
In November 2023, the commission thwarted the Vawters’ efforts, denying their request to obtain a “certificate of appropriateness” to raze the home.
Such a denial, however, is only effective for three years, after which the Vawters would be free to demolish the home. The Vawter’s three-year period is set to expire in November.
Demolition by neglect?
Rather than give in to what they consider the neighbors’ improper control of their property, the brothers since 2023 have allowed the home to sit, uninhabited, with its windows and doors covered in plywood, raising accusations that they were engaging in a process of “demolition by neglect.”
The term refers to the practice of allowing a property to so degrade that it becomes dangerous, making demolition warranted. Or else the property falls into such disrepair that the cost of renovation becomes far greater than the price the renovated property would fetch on the open market — again making a case for demolition.
Earlier this month, having long-standing concerns about the vacant buildings and the loss of historic structures, Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas proposed a trio of ordinances, including one that would require further review for requests to demolish historic buildings, even when they are considered dangerous. The ordinance is to be discussed in committee next week.
When the Vawters’ property went on the market, at least one buyer had shown initial interest. Ryan Hiser, along with his partner, David Tran, own and run two bed-and-breakfast boutique hotels in renovated homes in the Southmoreland neighborhood. They include The Truitt Hotel, 4320 Oak St., and The Aida Hotel KC, 206 E. 44th St. established inside a renovated 1903 limestone home.
Hiser and Tran had said that they made a $1.3 million offer on the Vawters’ home, knowing that they might have to put in as much as $1 million more to renovate it into another boutique bed-and-breakfast.
The Vawters, at that time, rejected the offer.
