Meet Gwen and Bob V., now in their late 70s, who moved into The Highlands at Kensington Park last fall. Both Gwen and Bob were born in Baltimore, Maryland, and met while in high school through mutual friends. Gwen attended Eastern Academic, an all-girls school, while Bob attended all-male Baltimore Polytechnic Engineering. At the time they were both dating other people but couldn’t resist the unmistakable electricity between them that was soon to become much more.
Bob began college at Cornell University, while Gwen became the director of admitting at a Baltimore hospital. When Bob returned to Baltimore from Ithaca and enrolled at Johns Hopkins University, he and Gwen were married. While Gwen was kept busy raising twin girls, Bob continued at Johns Hopkins, earning both a Master of Science degree and a Doctorate from the School of Public Health.
During their individual careers, Gwen as an office manager for a group of neurosurgeons and Bob as a hospital management consultant, they found time to start their own home-renovation business. Their daughter Kim, who lives in Bethesda, is the nursing director of the ICU at Suburban Hospital. Kim is the primary reason why Gwen and Bob moved to the area from Lutherville in Baltimore County and became a part of our Kensington Park family.
With talk of retirement almost 25 years ago, Gwen and Bob decided that, after breathing new life into many old and dreary houses, they would open a bed and breakfast — an idea planted by daughter Kim, who found the industry flourishing in California, where she was then living. They bought an old Victorian mansion in Lutherville and converted it into what was named the “Twin Gates Bed and Breakfast Inn.” They operated the inn for 12 years, with Gwen serving as innkeeper and Bob doing duty as the wine and cheese server each evening and the dining room waiter on weekends. Gwen and Bob’s B&B was rated one of the “100 Best Inns in America” in 1990 and was featured in many travel magazines and guidebooks, including “The Innkeeper’s Register.” The couple describe Lutherville as a small, enjoyable, quaint town, built around a Lutheran church — a Victorian-style village not unlike Kensington.
Following the sale of their business, they relocated to California to be near their new grandchildren, and while there started yet another new business staging homes for sale, a forerunner of HGTV’s home-staging! In their spare time the couple enjoyed traveling.
Their favorite destinations were Hilton Head, SC, and Sanibel Island, FL, where they owned second homes. During their travels they often stayed at other B&Bs and would masterfully pick the brains of the owners for tips.
On any given evening you can find Gwen and Bob on a leisurely walk, delightfully getting to know their new hometown of Kensington.