When looking at homes to live in, buyers see it all — crazy paint colors, carpeted bathrooms, hodge-podge layouts and questionable DIY jobs. And there can be design choices that scare many folks off. But it can also be a selling point for others.
When Anne Thorne and her husband, Mike, toured a custom midcentury home in Liberty, the place was full of bold design choices. The elderly sellers were the original owners of the 1960s home and had clearly decorated the home to their individual taste instead of worrying about future owners. The house was full of pink and green decor — pink kitchen tile, green-washed paneling, pink window trim, pink blinds, and — most notably — plush emerald green carpet.
Many buyers, if they weren’t scared off by the bold decor, would be itching to rip it all out the second they moved in. But not Anne.
Anne and Mike fell in love with the home the second they walked in. A family friend owned it, and it hadn’t even hit the market. They found out about the home being put up for sale through the grapevine, and asked to see it immediately, leaving in the middle of their dinner to tour it.
They never even looked at another house. This was the one.
That was 2016. While Anne and Mike did change some of the original owner’s decor (sorry, pink window blinds), Anne loved their bold taste. She appreciates the thoughtful and unique design the owners incorporated throughout the home and tried to incorporate as much of it as possible when bringing in their own design plans and furniture. She loves the solid wooden doors, the built-in planters and — yes — the plush emerald green carpet. After they moved in, Anne said longtime neighbors stopped by and asked to walk on it because it had been previously covered in plastic and they had never been allowed to.
And yes, it’s as comfy and soft as you can imagine. The kind you can sink your toes into.
Eight years later, the Thornes and their four children love this home and couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
The house is a bit on the smaller side — 2,000 square feet — but the family of six makes it work.
“We like being in a really small space together,” says Anne. “I like how I have to be creative with space and mindful of what I bring in since the house is small. Everything has to have a place. It’s freeing.”
Anne is a florist with her own business, Thorne Floral, and her favorite part of the home is all of the plants. She’s filled the built-in planters inside with monsteras, snake plants and ZZ plants. And she’s doing her best to care for the amazing landscaping outside — like the tall rhododendron, the ginkgo tree, a huge Japanese maple and the bright pink azaleas.
Also filled with plants is Anne’s favorite room, a solarium off of the sunken dining room with original emerald green square tile. Anne says the space is dreamy at night, and she’s decorated it with disco balls and twinkle lights so it’s extra cozy and sparkles in different ways throughout the day. The thrifted wooden armoire in the solarium is filled with secondhand quilts that Anne buys up to sew into clothing — a big commitment of storage in such a small space, but, to Anne, it’s worth it.
Thrifted and antique decor adorns most of the house, from quirky handmade planters in the kitchen to sentimental art from when her children were little in the dining room.
The Thornes’ home is all, really, a secondhand find – but in the best way possible, like when you stumble upon a holy grail of an object at the thrift store. Anne and her family are loving stewards of their midcentury home, honoring the people who so lovingly built it and crafted it from the start while still modernizing it to suit their taste and needs, making sure it still has plenty of character and charm for future generations.