originally drafted in 2016
The first time I saw HGTV’s “Fixer Upper” was the Friday we found out we were moving to Atlanta. I had always heard people talk about the show or the couple in passing and usually with great admiration, but it wasn’t until a college friend commented on an Instagram post of mine last Christmas that my interest was peaked. I took it as a compliment and moved on- if my house reminded anyone of anything they had seen on HGTV, it had to be a good thing…right? Still, it was another 5-6 months before Ryan + I finally got around to finding an episode (or three) to watch. The instant gratification of a before + after show is highly addicting! I can say, as the wife of an architect, it never happens that fast in real life; the rule is you can have your project done 1. fast / 2. cheap / or 3. well; you can have it two of the three ways, but rarely, if ever can you have all three.
When I walked into Ryan’s bachelor pad in winter of 2009, the home that later became our nest for our first four years together as a family, it was the moment I knew he was the one. As a young professional architect at a local firm, he had taken a chance on a quaint townhome in a prime location of Mt. Pleasant after relocating there post college. The horror stories he still tells of the layers upon layers of wallpaper, peptobismol-pink rooms and painted closet doors to match were just the beginning of his first “fixer-upper” story. I realize now, my fateful steps over his threshold to meet his loyal companion (Chipper), also matched me with this life of fixing up an old house. I have not chased a dream so passionately before or since. Obviously, in a booming area like Charleston, SC, many have jumped on the renovation bandwagon, but few do it well + far too many have gutted the unique older homes that existed across the lowcountry for the sake of making good on their investment in the property.
We have together, always dreamed of what our next home would look like and what kind of “fixing” it would need. Friends + family have occasionally said to me “since you’re married to an architect, y’all must have your perfect house planned!”…the answer is not really. We have always tossed around snippets of ideas as they come to us and as contradictory as it may sound, we both know the look + feel we seek in a quintessential fixer-upper. We constantly joke, that Ryan will probably become the architect turned contractor hybrid while I will be able to keep stock piling the antiques I love for good reason!
______
2024 update:
it’s so neat to look back + see how far we’ve come, but also how close we’ve always been to this authentic life we seem to have been destined to live. while i genuinely aim to stay focused on the blessings of each present day, we have + continue to dream of what “fixer-uppers” may be in our future. in the meantime, i hope to encourage more of our pencil + ink clients to incorporate the use of old things in each of the spaces of their lives, because of the charm they bring, the depth + meaning they add, even if just one small thing per room. we simply cannot always push forward into the future without taking a small part of our past with us. often, we are told these mementos are merely clutter, but when they are integrated with thought + intention they can bring something that cannot be bought + remind us of how far we have traveled as well as how far we have yet to go.
