Name: Rosie & Matt
Location: Highlands neighborhood — Louisville, Kentucky
In January of 2008 we began the process of converting our new house, a very dark, cramped 1950s house with a bad 90s remodel into the space you see in the photos. I am a graphic artist, and my husband, Matt Frederick, is a furniture designer. We did all the design of the interior spaces ourselves, as well as most of the work.
The big idea for the public spaces in the house was to make them as gallery-like as possible. We have literally hundreds of silk screen prints and dozens of paintings, so we wanted a) an excuse to have them framed (still working on that) and b) the ability to rotate our collection in as flexible, bright, and airy an environment as possible.
Among a few of the many things we did: We knocked down all the dining room and kitchen walls and appropriated a spare bedroom to create a large open kitchen/dining area; we turned the dining room window into French doors exiting onto a newly raised deck; we repainted absolutely every surface of the house; planted a perennial garden and created two limestone walkways. No surface was left untouched.
Thanks Rosie & Matt!
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Commercial Flour Sa...
Have we done away with candles on the dining room table? The trend seems to be flowers and things.. I was just thinking?
wonderful ceramics display! and great landscaping too. would love to see a house tour.
Gorgeous! Would love a house tour with some before pictures.
I really love the way you have managed to display your many things without having it look cluttered and overwhelming. Well done. The fornt of the house is spectacular.
Nice job. Kitchen look particularly great.
This is beautiful, very inspiring! I absolutely adore your landscaping, too.
what a lovely home! I particularly love the display boxes in the dining room and the beautiful landscaping in the front yard.
Is the stove really in front of a window?
This might come off as a huge insult but... those kitchen cabinets aren't the ones pictured here, from Ikea, are they? http://www.planakitchen.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/ikea_akurum_nexus6.jpg
nice job !!
Love the white walls. Any chance you could share your paint color?
Lovely! Nice job, friends. xo
Hello all! Thanks for the comments! What a lovely surprise to see the house call. This is Rosie. In response to LittleEddie, The cabinets are really only half IKEA- mostly the part you don' see. The interior boxes are IKEA but my husband built the door fronts out of Bamboo and the side cheeks out of walnut. The red boxes above are IKEA media cabinets that we cut down to size to fit on the wall.
Sorry for the misspelled don'. Also- the drawer pulls are IKEA, which is in part why they appear almost exclusively as IKEA without a closer up view of the wood. (We were dealing with both budgetary and time constraints since we were living in the mess while we worked on it). Thanks!
what an awesome, liveable, realistic space!
i especially love those red kitchen cabinets :D
What a beautiful front yard -- the whole place looks very nice.
The garden is magnificent! Just the kind of ordered chaos and profusion of greens and levels and textures that I would aspire to plant, myself. Not that I have ever actually HAD a yard....
come to my apartment and decorate! this place is amazing... and the garden is so great! the whole place is a piece of art
Front yard is to die for!
I think the white is Porter Paint's Queen Anne's Lace. I will double check when I get home.
I love the shelves in the dining area... simple, but a big impact.
Love the bedroom fan! Super cool!
LaurainCancun- thanks for liking the shelves! Matt built them and what I love about them is that he built them using French cleats, so no hardware is visible when you look at them, so they appear to be floating.
Huge pile of extra points for the landscaping!!! Of course I'm envious that you can grow liriope so well...it's a struggle up here in the NE. But the colors and textures are wonderful!
very nice! esp. love the splashes of red that tie everything together & the landscaping.
whoo! Nice to see some Louisville love on here!
Lovely, would love to see more! Especially love the yard!
2nd request for white paint color.
Very nice job btw :)
Lovely!
Rosie: what kind of wood did your husband use to make those box shelves in the dining room? They look amazing!
The white paint:
The kitchen/dining/living area is Porter Paint's Linen Ruffle. The upstairs is a slightly more beige white for warmth, and that color is Porter Paint's Water Chestnut.
Boxes:
Matt made the boxes in American Black Cherry with a hand-rubbed oil finish.
love it!!
Awesome! I live in louisville, I'm glad to see some fellow Louisvillians on here!
I love the shelves. Would you husband be willing to share how he made them?
Hey neighbor! Good to see Louisville represented here, I'm in the Highlands as well.
I really like the shelving in the dining room; kitchen looks great too. :-)
All your shelves/cabinet-type storage space is pretty awesome. I like the limited upper cabinet storage you have with the media cabinets; reassures the anti-open shelving ppl while still not making things claustrophobic. :)
I love the teapot (+kettle) collection! :D
Handsome dog, lovely art, nice house! What are the large plant pots standing on?
Lovely place... and I think that is the first ceiling fan I have ever seen that I liked!
edmarch: The potted plants are stainless steel disks with casters from Ikea. I tried every imaginable kind from all over and those are the best ones I have found. They carry a heavy load without breaking and roll very smoothly in all directions, plus they look great.
AnastasiaBeaverhausen: Thanks! I love that fan too. I am not a huge fan of fans. We took that out of our previous house bc I thought it had an artful, sculpture-like quality about it that most fans don't have. It's Cirque by Minka-Aire.
Moonseeme: I'll ask Matt about the boxes.
I think your home is very attractive, unique and inviting. Lots of interesting objects but not too much. WELL DONE in all regards!
A House Tour would certainly be nice.
Your home is very beautiful. I'd like to see more, I wish this were a full house tour. Honestly, these small tours are such teasers.
I love the display in your dining room, and you have a great collection of art.
Wow! From the outside I'd never suspect such a modern look. Red,black & white is one of my favorite color combos, and I've never seen it carried of better than in your home.
Just lovely!
Just for the contrast, I think I would have made the kitchen table black.
AGAIN.....why no square footage mentioned?
Do they rent or own?
How long have they lived there?
This is all info that is being left off on a lot of tours lately!
I think on House Calls they don't normally do that. We've been here since Jan 2008, and we own our house. 1700 sq ft. Hope you enjoyed the photos, and if they ask us to do a House Tour I will be able to show a lot more and the crazy ugly before photos of the house. Thanks everyone! :)
Would love to do this to our 50's house. Especially love the kitchen. Great job!
I love your kitchen and your front yard is beautiful. I would also love to see a house tour.
Cute pup!
absolutely beautiful! especially the garden.
Wonderful! Beautifully styled without becoming academic. Congratulations!
Love the front yard. Just got about 5 ideas from looking at the photo!
Beautiful inside and out! Would love to see more!
Great job! I live in Crescent Hill right down the road...I hope to one day get on AT! Good to see Louisville represented, especially a highlands home :) Looks beautiful!
I love Crescent Hill! It's another classic Louisville neighborhood.
I LOVE the little table in the kitchen. Did you guys make it?
The top is a really beautiful cross hatch bamboo butcher block that Matt custom fit to the area. The bottom are Ikea legs. We needed to get something up fast. If they do a house tour, you'll be able to see the new table base he is building out of walnut that will also have some storage near the top. Some things had to be left to "phase 2" since we were living in the mess while we built everything :)
Love the front landscaping!