50 SUMMER 2020 | WWW.SHAKER.LIFE
The Hisaka House was the City’s first truly
contemporary house, upsetting decades-old
Shaker housing conventions. At the time, it was
the only house in Northeast Ohio to have an
Honors Award from the American Institute
of Architects.
Shaker Life featured the house in 2012. It was,
and still is, owned by Dan Mansoor and his wife,
Joyce Rothschild. In 2011, Hisaka came to town
for an event called “Don Hisaka, the Cleveland
Years,” arranged by the Cleveland Artists
THE
HISAKA
HOUSE
Foundation at the Beck Center for the Arts. He paid a visit to the house.
“He did a walk-through and spent a little time. It was fun to talk to him,”
Mansoor told us in 2012.
The house is overwhelming in its charm, but not its size. At 3,200 square
feet with three bedrooms and two-and-a-half baths – and no formal dining room,
no basement, and no attic – it’s eminently suitable for four people or fewer, and
particularly comfortable for those willing to eschew the luxuries of a traditional
home for those of an architectural work of art.
THE LATE ARCHITECT
DON HISAKA DID A
LOT OF WORK AROUND
GREATER CLEVELAND
WHEN HIS COMPANY
WAS HEADQUARTERED
HERE IN THE 1960S
AND ‘70S. BUT THE
1968 HOUSE HE
DESIGNED AND BUILT
IN SHAKER FOR HIS
FAMILY IS HIS MOST
ENDURING LEGACY IN
THESE PARTS.
THIS IS
THE HISAKA
HOUSE.
Photography by Kevin G. Reeves
/WWW.SHAKER.LIFE