The Southern Living Idea House
11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m., today, $12, 57 Morgan St., Senoia. For tickets, 2012southernlivingideahouse.eventbrite.com. For more information, www.southernliving.com/home-garden/idea-houses/idea-house-00417000077170/
The Idea House is also open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Saturdays, and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Sundays from now through December. $12, 57 Morgan St. Senoia. www.southernliving.com/ideahouse
Metro Atlanta is known for many things but not necessarily for having a strong preservation instinct.
It’s true that the city’s antebellum architectural past was pretty much incinerated by Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman during the Civil War. But over the past 150 years the city and the rest of the metro area haven’t done as good a job as cities such as Charleston, S.C., or Savannah in maintaining what little remains of that era. Over the decades, “Tear that old thing down” could well have been metro Atlanta’s motto.
But south of the city, down in Senoia, there is an 1830s farmhouse that has survived, if not thrived. The house was recently revamped by Southern Living magazine to become its 2012 Idea House, which is now open to the public.
It is not a pristine restoration so much as a renovation of a structure that is as old as the city itself. It’s a renovation that has preserved the floorboards well worn over time by families who have called the place home. But it has also been adapted to modern living, with a kitchen worthy of a “Top Chef” meal and a wrap-around porch meant to encourage an impromptu cocktail gathering with neighbors who might pass by.
The house will be open Saturday from 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. for a special tour with the designers, architects and builders who took seven months to resuscitate the house.
“You can’t beat the quality of old homes,” said Jessica Thuston, executive editor of Southern Living magazine. “The walls, moldings, floors, you just can’t beat it, especially in the South. And with this house we embraced that authenticity. You don’t go into an old house and strip it, then put in stock crown molding from Home Depot. You keep what you can.”
To restore the house the magazine chose the high-end Historical Concepts firm of Peachtree City, which has built a reputation throughout the lower South for championing the region’s distinct architectural vernacular. Details such as ship lap walls and deep front porches are strong elements in their work. The firm also has a reputation for retaining imperfections in historic homes that some would consider liabilities, but that Historical Concepts considers essential to preserving the charm and authenticity of a home. So, as in the Idea House, the flooring does not match perfectly throughout, and there is a spot along a wall where there has been little attempt to conceal the fact there was once a door there. It has been boarded over, but beautifully so.
“We could have cleaned it up, but we didn’t,” said Terry Pylant of Historical Concepts. “We wanted the house to tell a story, so we didn’t want to lose that character by trying to make it perfect.”
The decoration of the house is not stuck in a particular period either. Interior designer Paige Schnell sought to give the house a feeling that the furnishings and art in the rooms had been collected or handed down over time.
“The last thing I want is for a person to walk into a room and be able to tell what year it was decorated, or to say, ‘Oh, that looks like the catalog from so-and-so,’ ” Schnell said. “Memories are what tie the room together and make you feel comfortable and good.”
There are plenty of memories in this house and more than a few ideas, too.
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