Robin Richards has been fascinated by the former Bloser Mansion in New Kensington since she was a little girl.
She had always wanted to go inside but wasn’t even allowed on the property.
“We were dirty looking little kids,” she said.
Richards went inside the mansion for the first time Saturday as part of a volunteer crew for Lost Dreams Awakening getting what is now the Sankofa Mansion ready for its reopening as a breakfast and lunch restaurant and bed-and-breakfast in June.
Making the mansion accessible to everyone in the community is a goal for Laurie Johnson-Wade, who with her husband, VonZell Wade, founded Lost Dreams Awakening, a New Kensington-based nonprofit community organization addressing substance use and mental health recovery.
Lost Dreams Awakening bought the mansion, on Sixth Avenue at Fifth Street, in February for $470,000.
“This belongs to the community. It’s not unreachable,” Johnson-Wade said. “You can touch it, feel it, be a part of it.”
The mansion’s four bedrooms are listed on Airbnb, and all booked for the U.S. Open, scheduled for June 12 to 15 at Oakmont Country Club.
Johnson-Wade said they’re aiming to have the restaurant open before then, June 1. Hours will be 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. The menus are still works in progress, but she said they’ll offer good quality, prices and portions.
They’re planning an open house for late May, but a date has not been set.
“I want the community to be the first ones to come see it,” Johnson-Wade said.
In place of alcohol, Sankofa will feature a coffee bar. Because of that, hundreds of wine and whiskey glasses and brandy snifters are being purged and up for grabs.
“We have no use for them,” Johnson-Wade said.
About two dozen volunteers were working outside and inside the mansion Saturday, removing unwanted plants and planting new ones and wiping down and cleaning. It was the first big work day, and more are planned.
“We want to honor the property and be good stewards of it,” Johnson-Wade said.
Tony and Robin Sarno of Springdale were coordinating the volunteers. They got involved with Lost Dreams Awakening from having loved ones in recovery.
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“Whenever they need help or need volunteers, they contact us,” Tony Sarno said. “We get the volunteers together and try to make it happen.”
Julia Warren of New Kensington will be the mansion’s housekeeper, one of its staff who will get room and board in exchange for working there, which Johnson-Wade said they’re doing because they can’t afford payroll.
Warren was found working on a planter in front of the mansion.
“It’s going to be exciting once it opens to the public,” she said.
Lev Kemp of Tarentum and owner of Lev’s Landscaping, was putting in some hard volunteer work removing ornamental grass on the side of the mansion.
“This is a great thing. We need more stuff like this,” he said. “I wish there were more people here.”
Johnson-Wade wasn’t disappointed.
“I got a nice crew in here of beautiful people,” she said.
While Kemp was removing plants, Peggy Sterling, of New Kensington, was planting new ones.
“Things like this need to be preserved. It would be a shame to see it not be taken care of,” she said. “This place will add to the community.”
Richards is connected to Lost Dreams Awakening through her daughter, who is a coach.
“I volunteer whenever the program needs somebody,” she said.
She was tending to work before exploring the mansion she’s long wanted to see.
“I’m going to save the best for last,” she said.
While the plan is for profits from the operation of the mansion to support Lost Dreams Awakening and its mission, getting the building back in order to be operating again has taken a great deal of effort and money, Johnson-Wade said.
While the mansion’s previous owners invested a lot into it, it sat unused for about a year.
“The startup has been somewhat extraordinary, more than I anticipated,” she said. “There’s been a lot that’s needed tended to.”
That included upgrading the rooms and paving the parking lot, which had been dirt.
“That was a must,” she said of the parking lot. “We want people to have a good experience from the time they pull in here.”