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What I Love

Andy Blankenbuehler, ‘Hamilton’ Choreographer, at Home in Harlem

Sofia Blankenbuehler, while out sick from school one day, heard a snippet of music coming from her father’s studio on the top floor of the family’s brownstone in Harlem. A few seconds later, there was that same tune again. And again (and again) for the next eight hours or so.

“She finally told my wife, ‘I think there’s something wrong with Daddy,’” said Andy Blankenbuehler, a choreographer and sometime stage director.

Well, maybe. But such obsessive attention to the music that makes him dance helps explain why Mr. Blankenbuehler has three shows running on Broadway (“Cats,” “Bandstand” and “Hamilton”) and why he’s also in possession of three Tony Awards (for “In the Heights,” “Hamilton” and “Bandstand”), not to mention the two construction paper-and-cardboard facsimiles of the trophy made by Sofia, now 7, and her brother, Luca, 10.

But the stage isn’t all his world. Mr. Blankenbuehler, 47, has long stuffed boxes and file folders with photographs and illustrations of mirrors and tables and sideboards that catch his fancy. “I’ve always been very design-conscious, though my taste has continued to change,” he said.

What hasn’t changed is the value Mr. Blankenbuehler places on home. During his early days in New York as a dancer in Broadway revivals of “Man of La Mancha,” and “Guys and Dolls,” among other shows, he moonlighted in order to afford the apartment he wanted.

“I had my own one-bedroom when financially I should have had a roommate,” he said. “And I bought my first co-op when I definitely couldn’t afford my first co-op.

“I always lived above my means,” Mr. Blankenbuehler added, “because I had a sense of the home I wanted to be in.” This tended to translate to charming, Upper West Side and heavy on the prewar details.

But his dream home — a residence with sufficient space for a studio — eluded him until three years ago. It came about, however, at a nightmarish time, during Sofia’s treatment for leukemia.

“It was hard emotionally for me to be at work, and Sofia couldn’t go out,” recalled Mr. Blankenbuehler, who gave up the studio he’d long rented in Midtown, and sold the family’s apartment on the Upper West Side. Then, with his wife, Elly, a physician assistant, taking the lead, they began the search for a place where there was room to roam, and room enough for a room where it happens.

Almost immediately, Harlem became a place of interest, “because it was an opportunity, maybe the last opportunity to have a backyard in Manhattan,” Mr. Blankenbuehler said.

The brownstone that was destined to become home had the requisite outdoor space, ample room for a studio, and a wall of exposed brick. It also had a very large metal back door, and that sealed the deal for Ms. Blankenbuehler. Just file it under ‘‘who can explain love.’’

“She saw the door, and it was big and beautiful and heavy, and it felt substantial and old,” Mr. Blankenbuehler said.

Work on the century-old house — repairing the stairs; repaving and replanting the backyard; redoing the kitchen, now a white, bright open space on the parlor floor; and building a studio, which has a small seating area, a barre and a wall of mirrors — took a year. “It worked out just as we had hoped,” Mr. Blankenbuehler said. “Sofia finished up her treatment and that same month we moved up here.” And, he added gratefully, his daughter is doing well.

Because of what the family had just been through, the house became a symbol of a fresh start. That extended to the furnishings, which in their old apartment veered toward warm colors and classic shapes. The décor is still represented in the form of the round-back antique salon chairs Mr. Blankenbuehler bought years ago in Toronto, the columns that serve as the base for a glass tabletop in the entryway and the bas-relief on the dining room wall. But the emphasis has shifted to the unadorned and the angular, in a neutral palette: the off-white leather sectional, the rectangular dining table and consoles.

Needless to say, Mr. Blankenbuehler spends much of the workday in his studio. He hasn’t yet determined the right spot to display the sheet music of “The Continental” that was signed by Fred Astaire. All in good time. Meanwhile, visitors can check out the back of the piano, which was autographed by Dolly Parton when she turned up during preproduction of the 2009 Broadway adaptation of her movie “9 to 5.” (Mr. Blankenbuehler was the choreographer of the short-lived show.) “I walked into the dance studio in Midtown, and she was asleep with a cowboy hat over her face,” he said. “And I was like, ‘How did I get here? Dolly Parton is asleep on my dance floor.’”

Tacked to a bulletin board in the studio are pictures and illustrations that relate to Mr. Blankenbuehler’s work in progress, a musical called “Only Gold.” A shelf above the desk holds his three Tony Awards and a specially bound copy of “The Fountainhead,” a wedding gift from a friend.

“I read it so many times in my angsting 20s,” Mr. Blankenbuehler said. “The book gave me my mantra, which was ‘Don’t be down the middle.’”

Even more foundational is a 60-year-old photograph on his desk. It features Hal Prince, Jerome Robbins, Stephen Sondheim and Leonard Bernstein watching a run-through of their groundbreaking musical “West Side Story.” “That picture is epic for me,” said Mr. Blankenbuehler, who knows a little something about groundbreaking musicals.

Now, so do his children, who, quiet as mice, often creep up the steps leading to the studio to watch their father at work.

“There have been times when I’m at a preview for a show,” Mr. Blankenbuehler said. “And the next morning, Luca will come to me with sleep in his eyes and ask, ‘Dad, how did the changes go last night?’”

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section RE, Page 6 of the New York edition with the headline: Kicking Up His Heels in a Home Where It (All) Happens. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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