At Home: Barns

May 19, 2012 | "We would drive around the country looking for old barns because Rick wanted a barn-board wall," said Nancy Turner as she and her husband sat in their antique-filled home recently. Weathered grey, the antique boards covered so many interior walls that the Turners didn't have enough. With the help of family and friends, Rick Turner salvaged weathered pine boards and old beams. Most people building a new house spend a lot of time at big-box hardware stores, but not Rick and Nancy Turner. In their search for building materials the pair cruised the rolling countryside surrounding the 40-acre rural lot near Cambridge where they planned to build. Originally used as sheeting on a barn roof, they were protected from the elements by wood shingles and are pocked with hundreds of nail holes. "If it was gonna rain, we took them in," Rick Turner said. The purchased boards, a contrasting warm brown, cover the vaulted ceiling and dormers in the great room. He pulled out hundreds of rusty nails... Read more »

At 100, the Hotel Edwinola straddles the past and future

May 19, 2012 | "It was no longer profitable," says Glenn Varn, 84, who married Eva Beach in front of the lobby fireplace; the fancy mirror over the mantle hangs in their Dade City home. "It was just a big hassle," says Janette Varn Saunders.

A Guide to the Blossom Garden Tour

May 19, 2012 | Creative touches such as an antique fireplace mantle and window boxes complete the outdoor room. A path leads visitors up a hill and into a woodland garden in the center of which stands a Paris inspired wrought iron gazebo complete with a chandelier

Great Spaces: Step on it

May 19, 2012 | (Photo by Rich Lopez/Courtesy of Steven Floyd) By Rich Lopez Sometimes it's difficult to find that just-right piece of art to hang over the mantle or to grace your entryway, but who ever thinks of looking to the floor? The people at Antique Floors,