From the pages of
Renovation Style® magazine
Stretching the Canvas
Painter Molly Lusk's crisp, simple interior redo of a formal three-story Italianate Revival, built as a lumber baron's mansion in 1912, would probably give period purists fits . . . unless they took a moment to look again. Then they would surely appreciate how her minimalist approach lets the architectural beauty and integrity become the art itself, instead of merely the canvas.
"Everything in my house is a food product," jokes Molly of her organic palette, both on and off canvas. "I like very few things for ornamentation, but need texture. With neutral surroundings, simple ornamentation really stands out. These interiors are much like my artwork. I'm just living in it and walking around in it."
Thanks to Molly's vision, the home she shares with husband Arthur Benson and daughter Emilie bears not a trace of the flamboyant excess typical of its period: no clamoring colors, no showy finery. Instead, original features are honored through a contemporary approach. The neutral but textural decor nearly disappears, allowing the eye to soak up the mahogany woodwork and settle on the leaded-glass doors and the starry host of Steuben light fixtures. With its up-to-date yet low-key look, the house is worlds away from the nunnery it became earlier this century — and from the 1950s decay that ensued.
This mixed marriage of historic structure and current style signifies a compromise between husband and wife that made the house acceptable to each. Arthur, a civic activist, didn't need to be persuaded. Envisioning all the fund-raisers the space could accommodate, he cried: "This is it! This is it!" Molly, on the other hand, was overwhelmed by the scale.
"It was so big, I thought it would be unmanageable," she recalls. "My taste tends to be contemporary, and at first, I wasn't even that interested in the architectural features."
By allowing her own artistic imprint to be felt, both in the renovation's hands-on labor and in the home's new look, Molly was able to relax into her new digs.
"My vision was not to restore the house to its period but to warm it up and make those large spaces seem comfortable," she explains. On the main floor, this meant using color, texture, and form — her favorite artist's tools — for a change of attitude. "It was mainly about painting and cleaning up," says Molly. And though a period look wasn't her goal, original features became even more prominent with her understated design.
To make the architectural details pop out, Molly muted the living-room walls with buff-tone paint. She left windows and doors unadorned to reveal the cherry-finished mahogany. The mantel shelf is a study in restraint: One of Molly's paintings joins architectural remnants that complement the carved detailing of the fireplace. To fill the room's vastness, she chose oversized upholstered furnishings in pale neutrals. The result is an orderly simplicity so clean, studied, and spare that it has a contemporary feel despite the old architecture.
In the dining room, she cozied things up with a ticking stripe. Hepplewhite dining chairs from Arthur's grandmother became user-friendly after Molly stripped their varnish, returning them to bare wood. With the setting simplified, the magnificence of the room's leaded-glass doors, dignified columns, and vintage fixtures shines through.
The kitchen, in contrast, was no architectural treasure. "It was horrible," says Molly, "a bad '70s do." Gold laminate countertops with a polka-dot pattern of cigarette burns were at home with two layers of sculptured carpet atop flowered linoleum. Molly plunged in, gutting the room and redoing it with simple sophistication.
"I just picked very simple things — cherry cabinets that are plain and honed gray marble countertops that you can sand the spots out of. But I did want great commercial appliances," says Molly. She warmed up the walls with paint and the floors with maple, then cast a contemporary light with sculptural Italian fixtures.
Just off the kitchen, Molly widened the doorway to the butler's pantry to create a breakfast room. Beneath layers of flooring, she discovered original terra-cotta tiles geometrically patterned with lights and darks. "It was fun to strip back the layers and see what was there," she says.
To enhance their entertaining, she and Arthur reclaimed a sunporch, which had been enclosed and used as a chapel by the nuns and as a family room by subsequent owners. Molly hired out the demolition work on the brick walls, then wielded a jackhammer herself to pry out the concrete floor. She furnished the porch mainly with "fourth-generation garage sale" pieces, but the focal point is a serving table topped with antique marble from a building that had been slated for demolition. Huge marble slabs were being given away to anyone willing to wait in line; Molly earned hers by heading downtown at 2 a.m., sleeping bag in tow.
Upstairs, Arthur and Molly converted a large sunporch into a master bath and laundry room. They installed a double-sink vanity and placed a soaking tub in front of the windows. "I bathe in the trees," says Molly, laughing.
The master bedroom is pure Molly — a nest of soothing neutrals. Instead of a headboard, plump European pillows crowned with framed architectural remnants suffice.
With its grand scale now tamed, and its look as composed and organic as one of Molly's paintings, the house is a tribute to the attraction of apparent opposites: Historic features retain their stellar quality, while contemporary sensibilities hold their own. Winners, all.
Where Old Meets New
Almost everyone can appreciate the charm of antique architectural features. But like Molly Lusk, not everyone is prepared to live in a museum. The solution: Strike a friendly balance.
- Choose a neutral palette to keep past and present in harmony. Shades such as cream, beige, or even what Molly calls "coffee ice cream" (the color of her bedroom) suggest contemporary serenity but don't detract from period details.
- Make a contemporary statement with upholstered furnishings, choosing oversized pieces and simple slipcovers. Choose traditional shapes to provide a transition between periods.
- Avoid patterned fabric, which dates a room.
- Paint, don't paper, walls. Keeping the shell simple accommodates both contemporary and original features.
- Where privacy isn't an issue, leave windows bare so the architecture can be appreciated.
- Create timeless interest with texture. Nubby fabric suggests a contemporary look; chipped-paint architectural remnants suggest antiquity.
- When in doubt, avoid clutter and simplify. "Much of the art is finding things that are so simple they work in any time period," says Molly.
