I USED TO SAY I would never live north of 14th Street,” Kenny Schachter says. Then, several years ago, he found a four-and-a-half-story townhouse in what he calls the “Lower Upper East Side.” It was decrepit, and its windows were covered in 3-D dirt. But it had natural light, outdoor space, and a garage, and Schachter has a thing for cars. “That is what really excited me.”
Schachter, an artist, writer, and lecturer, set about cleaning up the space. Except for a wall in the kitchen that was torn down to create a dining area, he preserved the historic integrity of the building. “My taste is wildly inconsistent, and the design of this house is absurd,” he says. “It has a modern façade, then antique French parquet floors on two…