This Restored 1800s Farmhouse is Proof That Some Things Just Get Better With Age

Surrounded by lush vineyards, the circa-1800s home came with a postcard-worthy setting. The interiors, however, were far from idyllic. Hadley set out on a 10-month restoration project to make the inside look like the outside. That meant refurbishing the old bones and reintroducing a 19th-century feel to areas that had fallen victim to well-meaning but unfortunate 20th-century updates. “My goal was for it to feel original as opposed to a modern update to an old farmhouse,” says Hadley. “The entire point of the renovation was to hide any signs of renovation.”

In portions of the home that still retained original millwork and hardware, she worked with local craftsmen to meticulously restore it. She also scoured nearby barn sales to find close matches to the house’s existing elements. When it came time to furnish the house, Hadley again took her cues from the architecture. The entry’s array of antiques includes a mid-century credenza, Louis Vuitton suitcase, and vintage artwork. “I have a thing for creepy lady portraits,” says Hadley.

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Hadley found the man's portrait by Jessie B. Parker at a neighborhood barn sale. “Parker was local, so he’s very well known around here,” she says. She hung it, along with a few other vintage paintings, on a wall in the “odd, T-shaped” living room. “There’s no natural position for a television,” says Hadley. “I thought this was a pretty successful way to incorporate the TV.”

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An old primitive sewing table is now a desk paired with a midcentury modern wicker chair. “Anything from any era can be mixed so long as there’s quality craftsmanship and each item has the design integrity to stand alone,” says Hadley.

In her pursuit to bring back some farmhouse feel to the updated kitchen, Hadley blew out the ceiling, took out all the drywall, and removed the upper cabinets. What she lost in storage, she compounded in charm, thanks to open shelving and antique boxes that keep silverware at the ready. She added brass hardware to the remaining cabinets and topped them with oiled butcher block. When it came time to choose the lighting, Hadley found matching milk glass shades and then went to a lighting store and pieced them all together for “new” sconces. Animal figurines populate the range hood. “I’m a sucker for tiny things,” she says.

An old printing-press work table is now a one-of-a-kind kitchen island with a little something “extra.” Shallow drawers that once held type pages now house cooking utensils. “It’s probably my best find in the last five years,” says Hadley. “I found it at an antiques fair. If it had gone through layers of retail and dealers, it would have been very, very expensive.”

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The 19th-century Singer sewing machine gets plenty of use by Daniele (a senior vice president at Ralph Lauren), who is always making things on the fly. When it’s idle, it takes its place on the dining room’s built-in shelving (original to the house) surrounded by old atlases, a collection of millinery (“one of them was my grandmother’s golfing hat,” says Hadley), and a very special scrapbook. “It’s filled with mementos from our travels—tickets, things we find on ferries, little botanicals,” says Hadley. “We also ask people who stay with us to do sketches in it. They’re always very funny.”

The office’s beams aren’t merely cosmetic. Hadley utilizes them as storage for leftover fabrics from various design projects. “I love my little nook—it has the proportions of a great room on a tiny scale. It’s a library, study, and fireside lounge, all inside 120 square feet,” she says. The most sentimental item in the office is the “So. Hadley” signage below the window, a Brimfield Antiques Market find from the Massachusetts town she was named after and where her parents were married.

Across the room in the fireside lounge, a mustard yellow wing chair invites an afternoon of reading. Hadley hung a mix of collected artwork floor to ceiling on the walls behind.

Daughter Grey Lily’s room is filled with family treasures, including a beloved quilt that belonged to Hadley’s parents. The painting above her bed was painted by Grey Lily’s great-grandmother— “an amateur artist, but a very good one,” says Hadley. In lieu of a standard nightstand, Daniele crafted below-the-window bookshelves to corral a child-size library.

Owning an antiques shop comes with serious job perks—or hazards, depending on how you look at it. “My house is never really done, because I’m always finding new items from my store,” says Hadley. One such recent introduction is the primary bedroom’s black spindle bed (dressed in yarn-dyed striped bedding). “As soon as it came in, I knew it belonged at the farmhouse. I’ll never let it go,” she says before hedging. “Then again, things are constantly changing around here. If something is perfect for a client’s house, I’ll take it over there.”

Hadley’s two-acre property is surrounded by lush farmland and vineyards, ideal for alfresco dinners with husband Daniele and daughter Grey Lily.

Designer Hadley Wiggins-Marin shares her insights from the antiquing trail.

Buying Rule
Every item in my store has to be something I would take home.

I Can Never Resist a...
landscape painting.

Estate-Sale Advice
Start with the basement. I find it’s where most people have put away the really old stuff, like grandma’s watercolors or cigarette cases.

Best Trick of the Trade
I start a negotiation by expressing my understanding that each of us, as spokes in the antiques-selling wheel, need to make our piece, and I’m not out to crush someone’s hard- earned profit, but I am looking for a price that works for everyone. This understanding tends to yield a lot of good will.

Store I Wish I Owned
The curation at New York City’s Cafiero Select is really tight. Everything is so good.