“Most of what I was finding had been renovated to remove the charm,” Yuri says of the boring box apartments that had dominated the listings. “I wanted something that had history and character, so it was great that I got to this one while it still had some of that intact.” Many might have been daunted by the workload, but Yuri welcomed the challenge. A plaster of paris bust of Yuri’s grandmother sits atop an old I-beam side table in the entry hallway, signaling the apartment’s industrial-chic aesthetic. The Tutsi milk jug was bought at auction.