A woodland bed offers an enchanting retreat in the home, and just a few touches make it Christmas-ready.

ention the term “lodge living,” and people invariably picture an enchanting mountain retreat nestled in Big Sky Country, or perhaps a cozy cabin tucked into the foothills of North Carolina. As far as lodge living goes, Charlotte doesn’t usually spring to mind … unless you’re looking to keep up with the Joneses.

Pat and Kay Jones’ home in Charlotte’s Ballantyne area is a medley of comfortable, open living spaces that pay homage to the treasures of nature. In fact, the home’s décor has its roots in both the North Carolina mountains and Montana ranch country, as much of it originated in these locations, where the couple and their children have often vacationed over the years. More recently, they discovered High Country Furniture, a Waynesville-based home furnishings retailer that specializes in rustic lodge furnishings.

“There’s a look Charlotte has and we’re definitely not it,” Kay says. “We moved from another house in Charlotte that featured spring colors, with yellow and lavender. So it was exciting for Jerry to be able to pull out pheasant feathers, moose, and bear.”

“Jerry” is Jerry Vick, an interior designer who runs his eclectic retail showroom, A Matter of Taste, out of the popular BlackLion home furnishings and decorating center in Pineville. He originally decorated for the family several years ago, and Kay recently asked him to refresh, renew, and augment her home’s style.

“Kay’s house is perfect for decorating because it’s so warm and cozy,” Vick says. “The country-lodge feel opens the door to allow me to decorate anything that doesn’t move. She has such great pieces already. I like to accent and dress up what she has. You can decorate everything and it looks in place.”

Outdoors In
The “lodge” never comes more to life than during the holiday season. Each year, the family incorporates pine cones, greenery, berries, poinsettias, birdhouses, grapevines, and wreaths into their decorating efforts, to transform their home into a winter wonderland filled with rustic Christmas charm.

“I told Pat that for Christmas this year I wanted to refurbish things, and then have a big brunch and have girlfriends come over,” says Kay. “Hospitality is one of my passions. Our guests tell us they feel so relaxed and comfortable when they visit, they don’t hesitate to put their feet up.”

The welcoming warmth begins in the great room, a space known as the cornerstone of lodge living. The room features a wood-burning fireplace crafted from Arkansas stone, with a mantel of reclaimed Kentucky mill wood. Both serve to bring the outdoors in, as do the stuffed red fox lounging on the mantel, with a pheasant dangling from his mouth, and the bear skin that adorns the wall.

At this time of year, a majestic Christmas tree, sporting ornaments from the family’s many travels, is the focal point of the room. Softball-size natural hydrangeas make a statement on the tree and throughout the home. Vick dusted the flowers with gold paint and added spray lacquer for heartiness. “There were a couple hundred of them, and I used them throughout the house to tie it all in,” he says. “The dried hydrangeas are just perfect for this lodge style.”

Another fireplace lights up the piano room, which features a white ceiling and darker inlays for a two-toned feeling of warmth. Flanked by two carved concrete bears, the marble fireplace is topped by a mantel of the same mill wood as that in the great room. “The mantel came out of an old barn in Kentucky,” says Pat. “High Country Furniture helped us find it and restore it. They left one log as it was, and the other one they cleaned up and shaped. It’s formal but still rustic.”

All In The Details
Continuing the two-toned theme of the piano room, the dining room exudes a blend of country elegance and historic charm, with its beautifully distressed table featuring legs painted a lavish red. A painter crafted a detailed prayer around the table’s edges.

“The table was just plain,” Kay explains. “High Country Furniture gathered ideas from what they learned about us and offered to paint a scripture around it. We chose the old-fashioned verse, ‘God is great, God is good, let us thank him for our food.’ It was the first prayer our kids learned.”

“My philosophy is, if you have a piece that you’re proud enough of to display on your dining room table or mantel, you shouldn’t have to take it down to decorate for Christmas,” Vick says. “You should embellish it for Christmas. Christmas is an accessory to decorating.”

Atypical doors line the hallway leading to the kitchen. The pantry door resembles that of an old-fashioned flower shop and, in fact, “Fresh Flowers” are advertised above it. During the building process, Kay and Pat discovered a salvage company out of Santa Fe, N.M., which provided the wood, and then designed the door to creak just as Grandma’s back door would. Kay deems it her favorite door, although the one leading to the laundry room, with its scrolled ironwork and natural decorations, is a close second.

“The laundry room is one of my favorite rooms,” she says. “When we were building, raccoons got in the house. We came in one day and there were mud prints of raccoon feet all over. So the artist repeated it in a mural in the laundry room.”

Sticks And Stones
In the kitchen, visitors are greeted by a charming, unfinished round table, which is encircled by Navajo-inspired chairs with rich, fabric seats and backs that have what Kay calls a “twig” look. “The table actually came from England,” she says. “We love it. Like in any house, I think this room is where everybody hangs out. It’s warm to look at and warm to have people here.”

The chandelier, made in the North Carolina mountains, is also composed of twigs, and the cabinets were created in what Kay recalls as “a little room with a guy with a drawing pad.” Completely original, the cabinets have an amber glaze, lending them a distressed look. A corner cupboard provides an interesting display area which, this time of year, hosts a beautifully recreated Nativity scene.

The kitchen’s tiles are a tumbled marble in yellowish cream, and the backsplash has intermittent maple tiles, adding to the warm, autumnal effect of the room. “I love fall,” Kay says. “If there was a season I could place my house in all the time, it would be fall. I have to work hard to bring in Christmas, or it ends up looking like a fall Christmas.”

Gracing the powder room is a picturesque mural of trees, and Kay evokes a hint of the holidays by placing fir-scented soap in the room. The theme continues in daughter Megan’s bathroom and bedroom, which features a bed that is an amazing structure of canopied sticks and twigs, plus more murals, including brewing storm clouds that lead to a rainbow, flowers, and frogs. Completing the room’s décor is a tribute to the 20-year-old’s April birthday, with calligraphy that reads, “April showers bring May flowers.”

A historic home in Asheville was the source of the warm wood utilized in the ceilings of the master bedroom and bath, which are dominated by white. A prominent painting in the bedroom showcases the serene beauty of a moose in the snow, a motif that is repeated throughout the home.

Upon moving into their home, the Joneses had folks from their church come over to bless the new space. “Our faith is very important to us,” says Kay. The home has been, she adds, the perfect place to hold church and youth group gatherings, sharing a unique warmth and spirit — during the holidays and all year long. TCW