One couple locks arms in design (and in color) with House of Nomad to refresh their South Carolina home.
When Leah and Fields Norwood got the call, their minds were blown. “My in-laws were like, ‘Do y’all want our house? We’re moving to Charleston,’ ” says Leah. “It definitely caught us off guard!” The timing, though, could not have been better. The couple was about to launch architectural plans to renovate their 1950s ranch, and, while they loved their home, they knew the opportunity to move was too good to pass up. “We’ve always loved my in-laws’ home. It’s so beautiful, and we knew we could make it our own,” says Leah.
With elegant traditional architectural details and dark wood accents throughout, the Florence, South Carolina, home boasted strong bones. While Leah has a background in fashion and design, she felt overwhelmed by the interior design process. “When you’re designing the interiors of your forever home, which this is for us, you just want to get it right,” she says. “I wanted someone to make sure we made the best decision every time.” A casual visit to House of Nomad’s former showroom on King Street in Charleston proved to be serendipitous, as Leah immediately felt a connection with designers Kelley Lentini and Berkeley Minkhorst. “You know when you just click and there’s a synergy between you and someone else? That’s exactly what I felt with Berkeley and Kelley,” says Leah.
Soon, the Norwoods locked arms with Minkhorst, the project’s lead designer. “They wanted the home to feel like them,” she says. “Leah is a fun-loving, colorful person, and our styles really aligned. Kelley and I love color, we love pattern, and we love clients who love to incorporate those things into their homes. It’s rare to have a client that wants all the color and pattern—a dream, really! So we had to balance how far we could take it while allowing things to breathe at the same time.”
With “beautiful molding and attention to detail, lots of paneled wood and brick,” Minkhorst was keen on not distracting from those elements, but rather complementing them with pattern and color. At the time, Leah had just taught herself how to install wallpaper, and, as such, wallpapers became the springboard for many of the rooms’ designs. “Typically, we’re pushing clients to take risk with pattern and color, the wallpaper, and the fabrics,” says Minkhorst. “But for Leah, more is more.”
A bold, colorful wallcovering by House of Hackney in the dining room served as inspiration for the whole project. Right off the entry, “the dining room paper had to be just right, and that took a lot of looking,” Minkhorst explains. “We wanted to embrace Leah’s and Fields’s Southern roots but give it edge with the color combinations.” The chunky millwork was painted in a complementary green hue, which, adds Minkhorst, took a lot of trust from her clients due to its boldness.
But for the Norwoods, bold was best, and in the home office across the foyer, that boldness shines. Dipped in a cool navy blue, the space is awash in color with the addition of another House of Hackney graphic wallpaper on the ceiling, while honey wood millwork warms the cool tones. “The wallpaper from the dining room and the office have this synergy,” explains Minkhorst. “It feels like there’s some history to the wallpaper, a little bit of tradition to it. There’s just something about these bold, colorful prints that really embody Leah and Fields.” Adds Leah, “You really have to know what you’re doing with color to get that blue in the office to work well with the maroon and the chartreuse in the dining room.”
For the Norwoods, their choice to enlist House of Nomad and Minkhorst to bring their dream of a colorful home to fruition proved to be spot on. “Berkeley and Kelley knew what we liked, but they also pushed us to do things that we may not have chosen but are still in our wheelhouse,” Leah says. “The team completely hit the mark on this home. We had an idea of what we wanted, and they made it happen.”
