Glenelg stone farmhouse gets Show House makeover

An 1805 stone manor house is Historic Ellicott City's 2014 Decorator Show House. Situated on 110 acres in Glenelg, Meriwether Farm, a two-story 5,757-square-foot home, received a three-month makeover by more than a dozen interior designers in preparation for the show, which opens Satuday, Sept. 20, and runs through Oct. 19.

"It is such a popular event," said Joyce Pope, executive director of HEC. "We generally have 150 visitors per day."

Those visitors will get to explore a house that rebounded after a devastating fire in 1950 that destroyed most of its interior rooms except the original staircase and front walls.

"A good section of the house caught fire," Pope said. "They tried to salvage as much of the historic aspects as they could."

By all accounts, the house, which sat vacant a few years and is on the market, was in sound shape, Pope said. While the outside needed work, such as landscaping, the inside needed little compared to past Decorator Show Houses.

"These old houses are not wired for modern times," said Carroll Frey, design chair for HEC. "The kitchen needed work but the rest of the rooms were pretty darn good. No restoration work was needed. The wood floors were in excellent condition."

After work by professional designers who prepare the house, the kitchen is now one of Pope's favorite rooms in the house.

"It was ... really in need of a transfiguration," Pope said. "It is one of the most charming. I saw it had the potential."

Frey particularly likes the work done to create a gentleman's dressing room. While the committee thought the room could be a bedroom, the designer proposed a dressing room instead.

"There is vintage clothing in it and ... some very good antiques," Frey said. "I really like the effort and energy that was put into the gentleman's dressing room."

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Glenelg stone farmhouse gets Show House makeover