In 1890, a farmer built a small, two-story home on his 1.2-acre property in Garrison for his daughter. When new owners took over in the 1940s, they built an addition onto the back of the house with a spacious kitchen and stairwell leading up to a large bedroom. The house underwent more changes in 2006, when its then-owners added a small breakfast nook behind the previous expansion.
A little over a decade later, Annie Mennes, founder of Garrison Foundry Architecture & Design, moved in. She had fallen in love with what was known as Nelson Farm—and so had her family. There was just one problem: With two adults, three kids, and two fur babies, there wasn’t quite enough space.
Mennes felt a strong connection to what she still refers to as the farmer’s daughter’s house and wanted to stay as true to its original spirit as possible. So, instead of adding a new foundation, she chose to build on the existing one.
“We basically added a second story,” Mennes explains. It gave them an additional bedroom for which Annie designed a loft with a bed on top and a desk and closet space beneath. “We added a ship’s ladder going up to the bed and a little barn door for the closet,” she says. They kept the rest of the space neutral so her 14-year-old daughter could add her own flair. “All three of our kids have very different personalities and interests, so each of their rooms has its own vibe,” Mennes says.
For Mennes, it was important that her whole family—including the kids—be involved in the design and renovation. “My children at the time were smaller, so they were a little less opinionated about the design, but it’s helpful giving them a say,” she says. “On some level, it’s about offering everyone the option to give input because that’s how you get the best ideas. I mean, ultimately, my husband and I decided,” she says with a laugh. “But kids have an opinion, so let them share it.”
Design and functionality are intrinsically linked, so Mennes advises taking the family’s lifestyle and needs into account when designing a home. And one of the must-haves for any family is a mudroom: “You need to have a place where you can come home, set your bag down, take your shoes off, and just be at peace,” she insists.
IT WAS IMPORTANT TO MENNES THAT HER WHOLE FAMILY—INCLUDING THE KIDS—BE INVOLVED IN THE DESIGN AND RENOVATION.
The original structure didn’t have a mudroom, so Mennes improvised by closing off the stone patio at the back of the house and adding a fun concrete tile floor. The tiny space features the perfect balance of open and closed storage. Hooks and shelving provide a place for shoes, hats, and coats, while a ridged-door IKEA cabinet blends almost seamlessly into the board and batten paneling. “The mudroom is what you see the moment you walk in, so it sort of sets the stage for the house,” she explains, “but it’s also its own little space, so there’s some opportunity to be a little different, to do something with your personality.”
Like many old homes, Nelson Farm was made up of a series of small spaces that just weren’t practical for a modern family. To increase usability, Mennes had the wall between the kitchen and dining room torn down, opening up the area and creating a central spot in the house where the family could congregate. Given the extent of the renovation and restoration, the kitchen design needed to be functional and beautiful but also budget friendly. To keep costs down, the designer took some simple cabinetry, added millwork and stylish hardware for a more customized appearance, and topped it with inexpensive butcher block.
A single brick column was left standing between the kitchen and dining room to keep the feel of the old structure. “It was never meant to be exposed to anything, so we had to rebuild the column on the backside,” Mennes says. For additional seating, she created a Silestone-topped island around it, painting the cabinets a dark gray as a foil to the freshly whitewashed column. “To make the cabinetry look built-in, we brought the island forward to hide the door face of the cabinetry,” she says.
MENNES REMOVED THE WALL BETWEEN THE KITCHEN AND DINING ROOM TO CREATE A GATHERING SPOT FOR THE FAMILY.
One of the challenges of having a small home and a large family is finding storage for everything. But with a little out-of-the-box thinking, it can be done. “Try to find a corner where you can buy a little real estate and tuck in a closet somewhere that you won’t even notice the room is smaller,” Mennes suggests. A favorite trick of hers is borrowing space from under the stairs, like in the dining room, where she cut into the wall beneath the staircase for a built-in cabinet to store glasses and other items.
While the home did get some modern updates, for Mennes, the project was ultimately about caring for the farmer’s daughter’s house. “It felt like this house kind of drove the project more than me designing it,” she says. And she was eager to hold on to the old-world roots of Nelson Farm. “It was about making everything look like it had always been there,” she says. That meant opting for traditional-looking details like wooden beams on the ceiling, shiplap and board and batten paneling on the walls, lots of millwork and wainscotting, and natural textiles and layered materials.
“I love going hunting at garage sales, thrift stores, and flea markets, and finding something that speaks to you,” Mennes says. Not only are these secondhand finds budget friendly, they’re one-of-a-kind pieces that can lend a space that special something. A gem of a find was the fireplace in the living room. “The house never had a fireplace,” she explains. “It probably originally had a wood-burning stove or something before electric heating. But that living room just begged for a fireplace.” So, Mennes found an insert from Pennsylvania on eBay and a vintage fireplace surround at a local fireplace company. She fixed them up, painted them black, added some tile, and, voila: a rustic-looking fireplace fit for a farmhouse.
As much as she adored Nelson Farm, there was something about it that bothered Mennes. It didn’t have a front porch. “It looked like a face without a nose,” she says. So, a front porch was constructed, and the screened-in side porch was enclosed to create a sunroom. The sunroom serves as an extension of the home and is right off of the porch with a book nook and a day bed to cozy up in on a lazy afternoon.
As for the porch, Mennes kept things simple with Douglas fir flooring and a plain porch swing. The posts are pieces of lumber that she molded to look like old, Italianate posts. “We spend a lot of time in Maine as a family, and there are many homes from the same era as this house that have some of these details: very crisp, little white details. So, we tried to recreate them here,” she explains.
“I feel like this house is telling a story,” Mennes says. “Yes, it’s a story about me as an architect and about my family. But it’s also a story about the farmer’s daughter’s house.”
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