The Saratoga House: Before and After…A Back Porch as American as Apple Pie

There are several overused phrases in the home dec world
that, after a while, make even those of us who pour through endless episodes of
Colorsplash and Design Star, or have issues of
Better Homes and Gardens and anything Martha
for lunch, tend to cringe at the sound of.
Sometimes it seems like every designer is told to think “out of the box”….every
new look is somehow “eclectic”…and every space, no matter how dreary, has “potential”.

Ironically though, the first thing that struck me about our
imperfectly prefect old house’s back porch was that it indeed had a boatload of
untapped “potential”, even though most of the family and friends I showed
pictures of it to tended to disagree. When it first became ours, it was a study in
70’s rec room chic, with dark wood paneling, old, spongy indoor/outdoor carpeting,
and a wall that literally divided the space in half. One side could only be accessed through a
small windowless hallway behind the main floor bathroom and held a 12″
television and a scary sagging loveseat, and the other was a cluttered storage
space for recycling containers and muddy sneakers that served no other purpose
than as a pass-through to the back yard. There wasn’t
even an actual door to the outside–just an old, rickety storm door that slammed
open whenever a breeze blew the right way.

So this area definitely called for a creative leap…one that
would require the assistance of someone who could swing a hammer and slide a
table saw better than the likes of my lovely husband and I. So with a little semi-professional help, the
wall came down, the carpet came up, and one wall of paneling was removed to expose
the beautiful brick from the original outer wall of the house that had not seen
the light of day for way too many track seasons (also hiding behind the walls
was an old paper wasp nest of Hitchcock movie proportions, but we try not to
think about that discovery too often!).

Once the outsourced items were completed, it was my turn to
have a little fun finding potential in a previously little utilized space. The very first step was to lighten the room–taking
down the wall definitely helped, but whitewashing the paneled walls that still
stood (creating a wainscoted effect) and painting the wood floor a dove gray
brought the sunshine in. Then it was important to delineate the purpose of the
room, and since our kitchen does not have an area for the entire family to have
dinner together, we decided dining space was a must. Like any casual eating area, this also meant room
for homework, messy art projects, et al.
And even though the room was now so much more than a pass through, it
still needed to serve as a mudroom of sorts for all the footwear, sports equipment,
and random clutter a family of five brings in the back door every day.

As far as color
schemes, I wanted to connect the space to the kitchen it feeds into, which is
decorated in pale blue and Ralph Lauren red, so a little Americana color scheme
began to emerge. This also made it make
sense with the rest of the main floor, and repeated some of the same style as
the front porch, and since I crave symmetry, this really clicked. And while the look is crisp and colorful, it
also became a fun design project that (I hope!) doesn’t take itself too
seriously…a great home for my husband’s “Dogs Playing Poker” print, lots of
rustic texture, and the like.

So yes, “potential” is a word we throw around a little too
much when we design, but sometimes it really sums up a vision that from
beginning to end becomes a pretty amazing transformation. I’m proud of what our back porch has become,
and the best reward of all is seeing everyone, including the family dog (who,
now that the wall is gone, knows exactly where to take an afternoon nap in the
sun on the newly painted floor), enjoy. J