Houzz Tour: Designer’s Home Has Evolved Over the Years

An Atlanta family’s townhome is layered with special heirlooms, an art collection and favorite vintage finds

Becky Harris September 26, 2021

Houzz Contributor. Hi there! I live in a 1940s cottage in Atlanta that I'll describe as "collected." I got into design via Landscape Architecture, which I studied at the University of Virginia.

Houzz Contributor. Hi there! I live in a 1940s cottage in Atlanta that I'll describe... More

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A designer’s own home is never really done, but nine years after move-in, the Atlanta townhouse that designer Gabriela Eisenhart and her family live in is pretty darn close. When she, her husband and their older son moved in, she was pregnant with their second son. While they didn’t have the money for any major remodeling, she layered the family’s style into the home by using special family pieces, great light fixtures, vintage rugs and artwork. The home was a constant work in progress, and Eisenhart was finally able to remodel the kitchen and primary bathroom last year.

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Photos by Jaki Hawthorne of Studio Jaki

House at a Glance
Who lives here: Designer Gabriela Eisenhart of Wake + Loom Design; her husband; and their two sons, ages 9 and 10
Location: Candler Park neighborhood of Atlanta
Size: 2,500 square feet (232 square meters); two bedrooms, two full bathrooms, two half bathrooms

“This home will always be special to me because it got me into the design business,” Eisenhart says. “Once I started to decorate it, people who saw it would say, ‘Please come do my house.’ ” Built in 2005, the townhome had great bones. “It had high ceilings and lots of windows, and back then they were still putting in real wood floors. But it was boring,” Eisenhart says. Located in Atlanta’s Candler Park neighborhood, the home is within walking distance of great restaurants, coffee shops, boutiques, music and theater venues and a MARTA train stop.

Working on a tight budget nine years ago, Eisenhart immediately changed light fixtures and layered the home with personal touches. She and her husband also got some great assists from family along the way. “My aunt made all the drapes for us — she was in the business and we were on a budget,” Eisenhart says. “We had to use the fabrics they had in stock, but I absolutely love them. In some parts of the house the drapes are 13 feet long, so I can’t even imagine what that would have cost us!”

Her husband’s family owned Eisenhart Wallcoverings for about a century, and though it’s no longer in business, she was able to use one of their vintage papers in a powder room. The unique black lamp base seen here is an old toile wallpaper roller that was used to make one of the company’s papers. (The toile pattern is carved in it.) “That lamp is my favorite,” Eisenhart says.

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The living room is on the main floor of the home. There’s a garage and bonus room on the level below, and the bedrooms are on the top floor.

Rugs played a big role in Eisenhart’s design. She used them to layer texture and pattern throughout the house. In the living room, the rug adds a graphic black-and-white print.

Comfortable seating was a must. A cushy sectional can hold the entire family of four. And Eisenhart designed the green swivel chair herself. “My kids basically treat this chair like a merry-go-round,” she says.

The artwork over the fireplace is actually a Frame TV that displays artwork when not in use. “I am the biggest fan of these TVs,” Eisenhart says. It’s a wonderful alternative to the big black box look of a TV over a fireplace.

Living Room Houzz Tour: A Designer's Own Townhome Evolves Over the Years

Built-ins that flank the fireplace display favorite objects, small artwork and books. Eisenhart covered the back of the shelves with leftover wallpaper used in one of the powder rooms. It provides a lovely backdrop, adding color and texture. Its trippy pattern lands somewhere between kaleidoscope and Rorschach test.

Though Eisenhart loves to seek out great art, some of the pieces in her collection found her. “My grandmother, Helen D’Agnese, was an artist, and these are two of her lithographs,” she says. “I have a lot of her work displayed around my house.” D’Agnese also made the bronze sculpture on the top shelf. “I love these pieces a lot,” Eisenhart says.

Wallpaper: Candice Olson Inner Beauty, York Wallcoverings

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The designer created a cozy reading nook behind the sofa with a vintage leather armchair. The textile is an African mudcloth. The large mirror over the piano reflects light and makes the living room seem larger.

Kitchen Houzz Tour: A Designer's Own Townhome Evolves Over the Years

The kitchen occupies the space between the living room and the dining room on the main floor. After living with the existing ho-hum kitchen for about eight years, the couple were ready to renovate just as the pandemic began.

“If we had done a full renovation in here, I would not have the microwave over the range and I would have made a few more changes, but a face-lift was a better choice. It wasn’t really worth the extra expense,” Eisenhart says.

They were able to refresh the existing cabinets with new paint and brass hardware, which saved a lot on the budget. They took out an awkward bar-height counter here and replaced it with a long island that’s all one height.

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The new countertops are durable quartz with very subtle veining that looks like marble. A trio of pendants adds texture over the island. The new faucet is a touchless model from Brizo. “I absolutely love the touchless faucet, it is super convenient,” Eisenhart says.

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This caned cabinet sits between the top of the stairs, the living room and the kitchen. It serves as a catchall, storing things such as the kids’ art supplies. “I placed this piece off the kitchen knowing it would take care of heavy-duty storage,” Eisenhart says.

The painting belonged to her grandfather until he passed away at age 100 last year. Eisenhart remembers being drawn to it from an early age whenever she’d visit him. Now it has a place of honor in the home.

Dining Room Houzz Tour: A Designer's Own Townhome Evolves Over the Years

The dining room is at the other end of the kitchen and enjoys the same large windows that the living room does. “The light in this house is great,” Eisenhart says. The modern high take on classic Windsor chairs and the contemporary light fixtures are good proportional fits for the high ceilings.

Powder Room Houzz Tour: A Designer's Own Townhome Evolves Over the Years

The home has two powder rooms. Eisenhart gave this one a cosmetic makeover by covering the walls in a vintage wallpaper from Eisenhart Wallcoverings. She selected the vintage artwork from her collection.

Family Room Houzz Tour: A Designer's Own Townhome Evolves Over the Years

This bonus room is on the first level of the home, below the main floor. It serves many purposes: playroom, home gym, movie night room, family room and guest room. An accent wall that looks like it’s washed in watercolors and a marbleized pattern on the chair add texture and pattern. So does the thick Moroccan rug.

The funky parquet table is part of a pair that came from Highland Row Antiques, a local shop with lots of great finds from the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s. (The other one is under the toile wallpaper roller lamp in the living room.) “I’m guessing it’s probably from the 1970s,” Eisenhart says. There are subtle nods to ’70s glam here and there throughout the design scheme — not enough to dominate the look, just enough to acknowledge that the couple appreciate the style and attitude of the era.

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This vignette is on a landing between two bedrooms on the top floor. Eisenhart loves a vintage treasure hunt and collecting art, and this gallery wall is full of fun pieces she’s found over the years. The funky light fixture also came from Highland Row Antiques. The chest is a hand-me-down from her husband’s family.

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This is the couple’s bedroom, also on the top floor. This level came with wall-to-wall carpeting. “I would have preferred hardwood floors, but we didn’t have the money to do that when we moved in and it wasn’t really worth the investment,” Eisenhart says. Instead she installed carpeting that was a better quality, then layered favorite rugs on top.

“The key to layering rugs is to use something with a different pile and texture than the carpeting beneath,” she says. Here she used a jute area rug under the bed and a vintage Oriental rug next to it. “I’m a huge fan of vintage rugs and they tend to come in funny sizes, so I just play around with laying them in different spots until I find somewhere that works,” she says.

Roman shades: Jim Davis Designs

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More extra-long drapes made by Eisenhart’s aunt dress the windows. The shades are made from a woven fabric that adds texture to the room.

This console has been with the couple a long time. “My husband went to college in Asheville, North Carolina, and picked this up back then for about $70. No one knew how coveted this type of midcentury furniture would become,” Eisenhart says. “The lines are just so good.” When the finish wore out, she had it refinished in black and it remains a favorite piece.

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The biggest renovation took place in the couple’s bathroom, completed during the pandemic. This was a full renovation, minus the vanity, which Eisenhart repurposed with paint and a new countertop, hardware, large vessel sink and wall-mounted faucet. “My husband and I are never at the sink at the same time, so using one large vessel sink here works fine for us,” she says.

“Our bathroom wasn’t big, but it did have nice high ceilings. Drawing the eye up was an important part of making it feel larger,” Eisenhart says. So she replaced the wall-to-wall mirror with a 48-inch round mirror that highlights the ceiling height. So do the brass light fixtures that she hung close to the top of the wall. She also knew that using a stacked composition for the shower’s marble subway tile would emphasize height.

Faucets: Brizo

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Replacing the existing drop-in Jacuzzi tub and its surround with a freestanding bathtub opened up floor space in the room.

While Eisenhart splurged on the shower tile, she saved by using an inexpensive black porcelain tile on the floor. “Plus I have black hair, so this is a great trick for hiding it,” she says with a laugh.

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The artwork over the tub is one of Eisenhart’s all-time favorite pieces. It was made by her grandmother.

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