Behind every home remodel or home addition is a family with a story. This one is particularly special to us, and we are thrilled to share it with you in the homeowner’s own words.
Tell us a bit about your home.
Our home is a 100-year-old farmhouse with a rich history in the rural oasis of Edgewood. We fell in love with the 6.5 acre property at first sight but understood we were taking on a daunting task in bringing the house, which had been remodeled multiple times over the years, up to its legacy. It was two separate, somewhat deteriorating buildings connected only by a breezeway. The original footprint still boasts the granite stone foundation from 1920. There were major additions and remodels over the years, some higher quality than others, but every surface and room of the house had issues.
What was your overall vision for your remodel?
Our vision was to create a dream oasis overlooking the 20-acre view of pastures and protected wetland we discovered behind the large old barn that completely blocked the house. We wanted to honor the history of the home and the property with enduring design and quality. We wanted to honor the barn we pulled down by integrating the beams and other barn wood throughout the home.
How would you define your personal style?
Our personal style is driven by our lifestyle of hanging with our friends and large family. We wanted our home to be beautiful but comfortable. It needed to be large enough to entertain the masses, unique enough to be worth the incredible amount of risk, time, and money we invested, and durable enough to withstand constant large gatherings, three sons, and our chocolate lab.
What is your favorite feature of your home?
Our favorite feature of our home is definitely the massive great room that Renewal built for us. The design team perfectly understood our vision of soaring ceilings with barn wood beams and a large stone fireplace to anchor the room. They seamlessly built out our existing kitchen island to create a much larger island to accommodate the new space, and perfectly designed a brand new kitchen with large windows positioned to keep an eye on our small goat pasture out front and welcome beautiful sunsets. On the other side of the room is a massive Nanawall that opens to the covered outdoor living, all blending together seamlessly, so it doesn’t distract from the breath-taking view of rolling pastures and wetland forest.
How has the remodel allowed your house to feel more like a home for your family?
We pinch ourselves every day we are blessed to wake up in this place. When we moved in, we were crowded and on top of one another and facing the largest project of our lives. Now that it is complete, we can all say it was well worth it. It is like living in a lodge resort.
What was your experience working with Renewal?
Our experience with Renewal was exactly what we hoped it would be and more. We entered the design phase prior to the Covid lockdowns. We can’t imagine going through this without the integrity and skill of the team at Renewal. With careful attention to detail, they seamlessly matched a 100-year-old foundation and multiple additions to a massive new addition… and made it all look like it’s been here forever. This was an incredible architectural challenge from time to time. On top of that, they had to deal with a local permitting and inspection process that was already notoriously difficult even before Covid brought everything to a slow crawl. They worked with us to quickly gather and store materials that were suddenly having supply chain issues, and their subcontractors became some of our favorite people. They were reliable, professional, and very good at their craft.
Any Advice for other homeowners considering a remodel?
I would advise anyone considering a remodel to do a bit of homework before jumping into it. A bid doesn’t really tell the story. We briefly considered being our own general contractors, and we are SO glad we didn’t make that mistake. We realized through this process we would have spent at least the same if not more money hiring subcontractors who had no reason to be loyal to us. It is very difficult to know (until it is too late) the quality of a subcontractor’s work or how reliable they are. We have heard many horror stories from our friends, and we’ve had negative experiences with contractors (not Renewal’s) we thought would be dependable and turned out not to be. Renewal’s business model of integrity results in loyalty and high-quality work. The best decision we made in this overwhelming process was to hire Renewal.
It was such a joy to work with this family on their beautiful home, and the results are something our team is very proud of.
