Orginally intrigued by Dilworth and its walk-ability, Paula looked at many homes, but ultimately fell in love with the 1924 Myers Park bungalow the first time she opened the front door.
Paula Lombardi purchased the “Westfield House” in 1994, downsizing from a larger three-story colonial home in Foxcroft. Originally intrigued by Dilworth and its walkability, Paula looked at many homes, but ultimately fell in love with the 1924 Myers Park bungalow the first time she opened the front door. “I had wanted a bungalow for as long as I could remember,” explains Paula. “Maybe my love of the bungalow came from my piano teacher’s home in Elizabeth when I was growing up in Charlotte. I grew up in the ranch-style houses of the suburbs, but loved the 1920s bungalows of Charlotte’s older neighborhoods.
Since returning to Charlotte, I’d been moving closer and closer into the city.” After both of her children were grown and gone, Paula decided it was time to change the way she lived in the home and hired architect Rebecca Fant to help her transform the space. “I wanted a downstairs master suite, and I wanted to open the house up to the back garden,” says Paula. “I’m Italian and I love to cook, so I wanted a bigger kitchen where I could entertain friends and cook at the same time.”
Over the next several years, Paula worked with Rebecca on the home, and landscape architect Laurel Holtzapple of groundworks studio and Morgan Landscape Group on the outside to create the spaces she craved in both. From initial design to finished renovation took about three years for the two-phased project. “My best advice is to get started as soon as you can, but to also take your time doing research and thinking about how you want to live in a house,” offers Paula. She adds that choosing the right team of professionals is the key to design success. “If you pick people whose aesthetic is similar to your own and whose work you really love, you need to give them the space to create.” As Paula worked with Laurel on the garden, she wanted to add a design element she could enjoy, a sculpture of some sort. In talking through the elements that would make this work, including a garden bench that would offer a place to sit and admire the piece of art, the pair chose a bench that actually became the sculpture instead. “I commissioned Reaching Quiet here in Charlotte to design and construct the garden benches after Laurel sent me photographs of work by designer/artist/craftsman Matthias Pliessnig for inspiration.”
Paula shopped locally to accessorize her home, but perused the Internet for inspiration that she could take to local vendors. “I wanted a modern fixture for my dining room and I searched the Internet until I found ‘Floatation’ by German designer Ingo Mauer,” explains Paula. “Then, I went to Lighting and Bulbs Unlimited to discuss and purchase the fixture. There is very little that you can’t find in Charlotte through local vendors.”
Paula slowly curated a collection of objects that she loved, with no particular style in mind. “I want the antique corner cupboard and the 1960s German lighting fixture in the same room,” she states. She purchased a sink by acclaimed Charlottesville potter Suzanne Crane when she first decided to renovate and told architect Rebecca that they’d have to design a powder room around the sink. “Rebecca new she could push me to do something quite modern with the back of my house, as long as it referenced the 1920s-Craftman roots of the structure.” This resulted in the window-walls in both the master bedroom and the upstairs guest room.
Paula calls her favorite room, the upstairs guest room, the “tree house”. “I love the vaulted ceiling and its location on the second floor. You look out the window wall into the treetops and sky. It’s the same footprint as the master downstairs.” A close second is the “dressing room” – a former bedroom turned bath and closet for the master suite. “The functionality is amazing and eliminated the need for dressers in the bedroom.”