When Jenn Johnson and her mother Patricia were looking for an investment property that was restored last year, a house in Waterford had such an emotional effect that they had bought them without stepping in. A jump over the fence (of course with the permission of the real estate agent) and a look through the windows of the American Foursquare from 1928 was everything they had to work for it.
Once a 250 hectare cattle farm was the property that has now been in almost 4 acres since then. The Johnsons saw an opportunity, says Jenn, “keeping the soul of the house and at the same time making it functional and timeless for modern life”. This principle directed every following decision. “It was as if the house had chosen and called to us if someone would bring it back to their earlier fame.”
Power moves
The first renovation challenge was to work for a month without functioning performance. Most of the original cultivation area from the property has now been divided into a development, the Glenmore Farm, and when the Johnsons closed on the property, van Meter companies extended underground power and supply companies to their property. It only took a little longer than expected.
“We couldn't work inside, so we just started working on the outside,” says Jenn. “We opened the entire crack concrete, we painted the exterior. We simply completely redesigned how the outside is based on a generator.” Jenn's father, engineer, “Jerry-Rigg”, a generator who works with a plug from the 1920s. He connected it to the fountain so that they could have the outside and generally have access to water. In addition, you have updated the house with a new HLK system for the whole year.
The right way
The careful attention of the Johnsons on the entire property inside and outside led to a postcard perfection, viable home. For landscape design, they chose natural materials such as flag stones and pea gries instead of cast or cast concrete.
They added box forests and Japanese Maple for plants, says Patricia. They also laid a curved sidewalk around the side of the house, which led to the true front door. So far there was only one sidewalk to a side door. “There was nothing that they combined with the front door unless they dealt with the veranda, Jenn says.” When we tried to interpret how a future family could live here, it would be the most sensible to have an additional walkway to the front door. ”
“We wanted it to be obviously bizarre and charming and how it was always there with the original house. So we used a pea gravel to expand it and make some curved lines in it, so it was not super -though. We replaced the specific path with flag stones and we used a lot of traditional landscape design,” says Jenn.
The creamy base color and the darker cladding remained true to the original design, but were also selected to address a modern buyer. Jenn, who left a corporate career to concentrate on her passion for real estate, is a broker at Pearson Smith Realty. When we spoke, she worked on the list of the house.
Indoor amplifier
An advantage for the restoration of an older house is the quality of the original materials and construction. Patricia says that only about four of the approximately 50 original windows in the house had to be replaced. The hardwood floors also kept remarkably good and needed minimal restoration.
The Johnsons restored the original properties of the house diligently, including the floors, plaster walls, basah panel shape, doors, brass hardware and installations.
As soon as they had functioning strength and were able to work on the interior of the house, they had to decide what they had demo. On the first floor everything was kept in the same place, including the kitchen, which was significantly renovated. “The kitchen was subjected to a dramatic conversion into a gourmet room that brings classic farmhouse elements into harmony with contemporary functionality,” says Jenn. “Bookmatched Quartz Thecters, a deep blue island of the Marine Blue with a corrugated farmhouse sink, and all new cupboards have given their new life.”
The kitchen also has a Frigidaire appliance package and an induction hob. In addition, they opened the layout and widened the space between the dining room and the kitchen to seamlessly mix guests and family offers between the two rooms.
On the second floor, “a state-of-the-art primary bath was added to increase comfort without affecting the vintage character of the house,” says Jenn. They broke through a wall and joined two cupboards (a warehouse and a walk -in wardrobe from a different bedroom) to create a larger primary bathroom and a walk -in wardrobe.
Fortunately, the natural light made the room bright and airy from all windows. They added tiles that looked handmade (“they are imperfectly imperfect,” says Jenn) and a bright, classic barn. Their design goal was to “pass the test of the time and to be high quality”.
Family strength
In December last year, the Johnsons met the Legard family, the original administrators of the 1928 farmhouse and the well -known antique tractor collectors.
Jenn says the family once had more than 1,000 acres in the County County. You and Patricia proudly showed them what they had done with the property.
“With them we sat with them at a time when this estate poured as a cattle votranch. The barns were filled with horses, ancient tractors poured the landscape, and the Summers brought the sweetness of blueberries out of an estimated bush nearby. Every corner of this house brought us a part of something much larger.”
Feature Image with the kind permission of Jenn Johnson
This story originally ran in our April edition. Other stories like this, subscribe to the Northern Virginia Magazine.