Down a leafy, unpaved country road in the heart of western Loudoun County's equestrian and fox-hunting country sits "Farm Home," a former faux Tudor turned Colonial Revival on 10.5 acres. An engraved fox points the way through a stand of river birch up the gravel driveway.
When interior designer Nancy West first saw the hulking Tudor, it had been on the market for five years.
"Prospective buyers had been daunted," West said. "It looked like something out of the 'Addams Family.'"
| Resources: |
| Nancy West: Noble West Design: 540-687-3357 www.noblewestdesign.com |
| Architect: John S. LaMonica, 540-364-6465 |
Built in 1976, the home's stodgy brick and Masonite siding, and awkward roofline were incompatible with Middleburg's gracious country manors and horse farms.
The interior was dark and dreary, with cramped rooms and an awkward traffic flow. Garish flocked vinyl wallpaper, plastic laminate countertops and gaudy blue ceramic wall tile decorated the kitchen and hall. West loved the challenge.
"I thought I'd died and gone to heaven," she said. "I can do something with this."
West and her husband, John, working with architect John LaMonica, of Marshall, Va., opened up the dark rooms, added energy-efficient windows and French doors, and manipulated the space and traffic flow to create a beautiful, functional home suitable for entertaining.
They gutted the first story, and updated the plumbing and electricity, but retained most of the original oak flooring.
"When we opened the walls and ceilings, there were huge hornets' and wasps' nests and lots of dead mice," she said. "We fumigated everything and demolished most of the interior walls down to the studs."
West enlarged the kitchen, knocking down a wall and converting the adjoining dining room into a breakfast room.
She disliked the original entrance, which opened to the main stairs and one side of the old living room.
"A fake gable roof had been stuck over the original entrance for a Tudor look, but it served no purpose," LaMonica said. "Its steep pitch stuck up above the main roof. From the back it looked like a spear. We removed it."
LaMonica balanced the rooflines and emphasized the new main entrance with Tuscan-style columns and a gabled roof detail that added ventilation.
Along the front, he added an 890-square-foot, sunny hallway foyer. French doors welcome guests to the breezewaylike area and ahead to the formal dining room, once the living room. Down the breezeway to the right is the new living room, where French doors open to a verdant deck. The room was angled to take advantage of the view toward Bull Run Mountain.
The foyer was the solution to the narrow space and mature trees between the house and circular driveway.
In the airy kitchen, a 58-by-96-inch island offers a downdraft cook top, storage and a ceramic-tile countertop digitally enhanced to resemble limestone.
As for color, West prefers neutrals, but she felt the house needed a warm palette because of the north and east orientation of light. The couple painted and glazed the walls with muted peach, soft mint and other luminous tones.
Outdoors, light taupe, beveled-cedar siding replaced the brick and Masonite, and the rooflines were modified to farmhouse style.
"What looked like stucco between the fake timbers was actually an inexpensive wood fiber sheathing that never was intended for exterior use," LaMonica said.
Indoors and out, the couple aimed for a Colonial Virginia farmhouse feel with an eclectic design. That aesthetic was carried through to the garden where West, an ardent conservationist and horticulturalist, used as many native plants as possible, including winterberry, magnolia and spirea.
