The lifespan of any historic home depends on the fidelity of each owner’s vision, and Kim Noland understood her role in preserving her circa 1905 house in Athens’s prominent Five Points neighborhood. Renovated with the expertise of custom builder Craig Moore and interior designer Tami Ramsay, the 4,500-square-foot abode offers modern livability while retaining historical integrity.
After moving into the house post-divorce with her three children, Kim decided she wanted a fresh start—not only in life but also in her living spaces. Gone was any inclination for moody colors or furnishings as she imagined a softer, more feminine aesthetic. While spacious in footprint, the home needed a few tweaks, namely to the renovations and additions made in the mid-20th century. Tami, a partner in Ramsay Nye, an interior design firm with offices in Athens and Ann Arbor, Michigan, noted that those changes had compromised function, flow, and natural light.
The kitchen was crowded by a cramped laundry room and a covered window that blocked the natural sunlight. Off the kitchen at the rear of the home was an addition with a bay window and “a really bad deck.” Finally, the upstairs of the home had been converted into apartments—common for the neighborhood—accessed by way of a rickety exterior staircase. Yet, despite the work it needed, Tami immediately saw why her client loved the property. “The bones were so solid and so good,” she says.
Interior changes included removing the laundry room; uncovering the window and adding a second one to create a kitchen focal point; removing the back deck and porch to create an interior mud room and garden room; exchanging the bay window for a fireplace and sliding glass doors; and enhancing the rear addition with an expanded primary suite complete with its own sitting room. Finally, the four bedrooms upstairs were transformed into three bedrooms, allowing each one to have its own bathroom and a spacious closet.
Color is key for the harmony of a home, and Kim’s preference for subtle, softer hues guided paint choices and decorative accents. On the main floor, rooms flow with the help of shared wall and trim colors, Farrow & Ball’s Dimpse and Inchyra Blue, respectively. Even with neutral paint, the spaces are far from boring, thanks to well thought-out accents such as fabric pendants, wallpaper selections, and bathroom tiles in pink and lavender.
“We’re known for color, but you can have a colorful home that’s more subtle,” says Tami, who kept things understated from a paint standpoint but added fun touches. “And we amped things up with texture, so each room has a fullness to it.”
Meanwhile, in the recently added garden room, Farrow & Ball’s Yeabridge Green is trimmed in the brand’s Calke Green for a “color explosion,” she says. Terracotta floor tiles are both eye-catching and practical. Because the house lacked sufficient storage for the family, transforming the former deck and back porch into a mudroom and garden room made sense. Kim is an avid gardener who craved a space to indulge her green thumb, while the three children needed a spot to drop their coats, backpacks, and shoes.
“We didn’t want to make the garden room just another room of cabinets, so we used cafe curtains to cover the open shelving,” Tami says. “We wanted wood countertops, open shelves, and a bit of an old-world look. It was a way to take advantage of square footage and make it interior. And we added custom reproduction windows, which resulted in a nice continuation.”
On the front of the home, the original porch is unchanged but enhanced by stately columns to restore its earlier appearance. Because the house is part of the historic Five Points neighborhood, each segment of the renovation required the approval of the Athens Historic Preservation Commission. The Commission had a photo of the home from its early days, including the flanking columns, which had been replaced by lesser versions during previous
renovations.
“Replacing the columns is all we changed, and since it’s a lovely, huge porch, we added a swinging bed on the left side and a seating area on the right,” Tami says. “Long story short, the changes were an easy argument.”
