Abode

After working at Crème de la Crème for the past nine years, store manager Winifred Wegmann noticed something: “I came to realize how much pleasure I take from helping people find something new for their home that brings them joy.” In March, she set out on her own, opening pour la maison in Townside Shopping […]

The new Northside Library, on Rio Road, says anything but “Shhhh.” From the outside, it’s positively jaunty, with aqua-blue and goldenrod-yellow accents dressing up the brick exterior, and surprising diagonals playing against the verticals of corrugated metal. One’s eyes travel to the tall entranceway and the single word, spelled in midcentury-style metal letters, on the […]

To hear Keith Scott tell it, the house his client started with was almost worse than no house at all.  “It was one of those early-’80s, quasi-farmhouse suburban houses that lack any charm or interest,” he said. “My client was really debating a tear-down.” So why had she bought it? The major reason was that […]

“An unfolding story” is how one Charlottesville resident describes her collaboration with landscape designer Cole Burrell. That’s apt —their work together has logged nine years and counting. But it’s also a fair description of what happens when you walk through the garden. From the street to the rear property line, the landscape here reveals one […]

To visit Tudor Grove is to step into a river of time. This venerable estate, just south of town off Old Lynchburg Road, has been standing here since 1800—long before I-64, Fifth Street Extended or apartments and subdivisions came to define the surroundings. As the gracious winding drive reveals the first glimpse of the house’s […]

The tiny house movement hasn’t exactly made its way to our corner of the world, but the scene at one local antique shop tells a different story. At Joseph Joseph & Joseph, customers enter to find a restored log cabin—in the middle of the store. Originally a 19th century tobacco barn, the structure needed to […]

Windows were once the middle child of home construction. You had to take care of them at some point, but you didn’t really pay them any attention until you had to. It was almost like you could see right through them. Then came the environmental revolution, and people went nuts for energy efficient windows. But […]

Two of interior designer Leslie Burns’ passions put a personal stamp on her work: fine art and travel. Having visited more than 20 different countries and worked as a fine artist, Leslie’s designs often focus on bringing more color and texture to a room. We asked her to tell us what she’s been up to […]

The best of both worlds. That’s maybe the easiest way to describe Gregg Bleam’s interest in landscape architecture. Bleam had always loved architecture, but it wasn’t until college, where he began pursuing a graphic arts degree, that he realized his real interest was in making things. “Landscape architecture brought together a lot of different interests […]

Among this year’s offerings during Historic Garden Week, a local star will be Verulam Farm. The Ivy estate has been an Albemarle mainstay for nearly 80 years, and these days it’s serving not only as a private residence but a grand backdrop for weddings and other occasions. In 1936, Courtlandt Van Clief, a New York […]