WHILE SOME PEOPLE BUILD THEIR HOMES ON THE SHORE OF Lake Oconee in central Georgia to enjoy the outdoor recreational life and beauty of the lake’s exclusive communities and the area’s seven golf courses, others choose to vacation there for a few weeks each year. The owners of this classically styled home on the golf course were in the latter group—but only for a short while. “We built the home from afar during COVID from what was then our primary home in Pennsylvania,” recalls the homeowner. “It was a difficult process because of supply chain issues.” Because of the troublesome distance between the two homes and the fact that her daughter, son-in-law and first grandchild lived a short distance from Lake Oconee, the homeowner and her husband rethought their decision and decided to move to Georgia full time. “We had heard about this golf community before we actually toured here and built our home,” she adds. “My husband loves to play golf, and we thought this area was a good place to retire.”
The homeowner furnished her home with the basics from a Pennsylvania retailer with which she was accustomed to working, which served the family well when the home was used as a secondary retreat. But after moving to Georgia full time, she thought the home needed a few touches to make it complete. While shopping at Scott Antique Markets, she met designer Franya Waide. “She purchased a Louis XVI chest from my booth,” says Waide. “When I gave her my business card and she noticed I was a designer, she asked me to visit and see if I could help her accessorize it and make it feel like home.”
When they met for the first time at Lake Oconee, the two women clicked; they found their tastes were similar. “The home was casually decorated with new furniture, which was fine for a vacation home but too stark to serve as a primary residence,” Waide says. “My plan was to warm it up by mixing the new furniture with some antiques to give the rooms depth and make them feel settled.”
Waide has a long history in the antiques business and a vast knowledge of European furniture. Her family has been involved in art, design and architecture for many generations. She first became acquainted with antique furniture when a client asked her to travel to Europe together to purchase an old secretary. “Right then and there, I fell in love with the charm and beauty of antiques,” Waide says. “That trip changed the focus of my design business.” Since 1989, she has split her time equally between designing residences and sourcing and selling antiques, first through a retail store in Atlanta’s Miami Circle that she owned for 25 years and now through Scott Antique Markets, online at 1stDibs and in a renovated warehouse in Chamblee. She has traveled extensively in Europe, finding the 18th-, 19th- and early 20th-century French, English, Italian and Chinese antique furniture, art and accessories she brings stateside for both her clients and other designers. As a founding member of the Georgia Chapter of the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID), Waide has designed many homes in the Metro Atlanta area as well as in other states. She currently sells European antiques through appointments at her shop, although she has refined the amount of inventory she carries to best reflect her clients’ interests in certain pieces, such as antique chests and sideboards. Her well-researched finds—she has European contacts and hundreds of dollars invested in reference books on fine antiques—are skillfully interwoven into her clients’ modern homes.
While she has built a design business around her love of antique furniture and accessories, Waide finds herself designing as many contemporary homes as classic ones. “I always want the home to reflect who the owners are and not who I am,” she explains. “I’m not interested in talking homeowners into excessiveness they don’t want or need, and I like to avoid discarding items if possible. It’s my job to point clients to what works and what doesn’t in design, stick to budgets and finish by dotting every ‘i’ and crossing every ‘t.’”
In her own home, she combines antiques with modern pieces; for instance, her breakfast room seamlessly coalesces an Asian antique with vintage English pine furniture and a modern octagonal table. To the homeowner’s delight, she brought this knowledge of mixing the old with the new to this Lake Oconee home. “Fine antiques give rooms personality and charm and keep them from looking like a ‘furniture store home,’” says Waide. She brought in vintage and antique Turkish Oushak rugs, antique furniture, wallcoverings, window treatments, custom pillows and accessories to make the home shine.
Waide also made it a priority to add the homeowner’s personality into the residence by incorporating her collection of flow blue porcelain and earthenware throughout the spaces. The designer wove some of the flow blue collection with other treasures and artwork on the living room bookshelves and hearth and created a vignette of flow blue plates on a drop-leaf table in the sunroom. The rest of the collection she reserved for an étagère in a corner of the dining room. “Antiquities like these blend heritage into a home,” Waide explains. “Along with individual pieces, such as the sofa table passed down to the owner from her family, antiques and heirloom furniture provide handmade history, patina and one-of-a-kind appeal. This type of furniture endures.”
She also infused the home with the owners’ spirit by framing personal family pieces and photographs and spreading them strategically throughout the home.
Waide placed antiques beside newly purchased furniture in almost every room, even successfully blending modern white-painted furniture with rich walnut antiques. Through the arched double doors that open into the foyer, for instance, visitors step in on a vintage Turkish Oushak rug that Waide says is a “work of art.” The welcoming front room features an 18th-century sideboard topped with an oversize, gilded Louis Philippe mirror. Antique pineapple-motif lamps with angular shades grace the sideboard while relaying the eternal symbol of open hospitality at the front door. Across the room sits the homeowner’s baby grand piano, where she or others play to entertain guests during get-togethers. “I like to say I use ‘antiques with flair,’” Waide says. “In the primary bedroom, an antique carved bench at the foot of the existing bed blends with the room’s newer elements when we added a contemporary fabric to it. In this room and in others, we kept the draperies simple in order to keep the view on the spectacular golf course outside.”
Working her way through every room, the designer used both new and vintage elements side by side to infuse character at every turn. Even the stairwell received the star treatment, with Gracie-style framed panels on the walls. “Gracie mural panels were once regularly used, as were printed fabrics and upholstery and drapery trims,” Waide explains. “All of these items are coming back in style to create a beautifully classic look. It’s the opposite of the recent past’s stark, minimalistic design style.”
A soft color palette of blush, taupe, aqua, coral, and muted green and blue flows throughout the home, blending with the green views of the golf course outside. Waide incorporated shades of these colors in the Oushaks, grasscloth wallcoverings and fabrics from Cowtan & Tout, Brunschwig & Fils and Thibaut. “Since the main level is open concept, it was important to keep the colors compatible and flowing from room to room and between the three or four seating areas encompassed in the space,” explains Waide.
While the homeowners enjoy living on one level, the downstairs terrace level is set aside for family, with quiet spaces for their grown children to work remotely when visiting and to stay in one of several en suite bedrooms. “I was used to dark Pennsylvania basements,” says the homeowner, “but this home’s downstairs level is light and bright thanks to sliding glass doors that open out to the backyard and golf course.” Since the back of the home sits up slightly higher on the land that slopes down to the golf course, there is a seemingly boundless view of the surrounding course and trees.
The walkout from the terrace level is enjoyable for all; the expanse of green lawn leads to a patio, firepit and waterfall feature that overlook the verdant golf course. Waide made her mark on the patio, bringing in comfortable outdoor made-to-order wicker furniture by Classic Homes that makes TV viewing, watching golfers on the course and sitting around the firepit with family a “super fun” experience, according to the designer.
“I love what I do, especially when I get to work with wonderful people like this family,” Waide says. “It adds interest to my life and work.”
Inside and out, the focus was to take the owner’s basics and add charm. “This home is easy to live in,” Waide says. “We have evolved the design over the last year, adding charm through storied pieces that will endure.” *
Dana W. Todd is a professional writer specializing in interior design, real estate, luxury homebuilding, landscape design, architecture and art.
A soft color palette of blush, taupe, aqua, coral, and muted green and blue flows throughout the home, blending with the green views of the golf course outside.
