The home tells a story, according to interior decorator Lynne
Meyer, and she prefers to start hers with a romance.
She and her husband Robert fell in love with a three-story spec
home in the hills of Holiday Lake Estates in Morgan Hill.
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The home tells a story, according to interior decorator Lynne Meyer, and she prefers to start hers with a romance.
She and her husband Robert fell in love with a three-story spec home in the hills of Holiday Lake Estates in Morgan Hill. Clinging to the side of a steep hill, high above the oak and pine treetops, and built almost directly over a fault line, it lured the Meyers with panoramic views of both the lake and Henry Coe State Park.
“Every room has a view,” said Meyer. “You’re either looking at the trees or the lake, and the view is always changing. In the morning, a lot of times there’s this veil of fog that just sort of creeps over the lake, so you really feel you’re rising out of the clouds, and at night, the moon reflects off the water. You can watch the falling stars.”
The house itself is always changing, too.
Call it the incurable bug of a designer or the fruits of a long labor, but the home’s interior has been in transition for the last 10 years. Meyer’s favorite room, a giant living room and kitchen combination, was only completed last summer.
“When we moved in there were white walls, white carpets, white doors,” said Meyer. “The banisters were this ugly oak, and the doors onto the patios were all just cheap aluminum frames. It didn’t look anything like what I wanted.”
So Meyer, who had rearranged her dollhouses and repainted her own room as a child, began work on her own masterpiece.
She antiqued the oak woodwork in a dark stain. Limestone floors replaced the white carpet and dated linoleum. Meyer commissioned muralists from Italy and Mexico City to decorate swirling staircase that leads to the master bedroom and the near wall of their cavernous ground-floor wine tasting room.
Finally, marble floors went into the bathrooms. The kitchen cabinets hiding the living room from view came down with a yank. And they ordered a 5-foot Swarovski chandelier for the entryway from across the Atlantic.
“That we didn’t know came in pieces,” said Meyer. “It got shipped here, and we ended up putting it together ourselves.”
Meyer then filled the home with an eclectic mix of European-style furniture, from overstuffed couches to antique divans and china cabinets, blending shades of pewter, gold, brown and black. The only word to describe the finished product is sumptuous. It looks like a spread from an article on Versace, with a little more restraint.
With an eye for detail in every room, there are a plethora of items to catch the attention of the passer-by, from Meyer’s collection of antique brooches and pins placed carefully on throw pillows throughout the house to the groupings of antique items that invite comment from nearly every visitor.
There’s a collection of almost anything antique tucked away somewhere in the home – paper weights, purses, perfume bottles, jewelry boxes and heart-shaped containers. The last is especially
important. The Meyers married the weekend of Valientine’s Day.
“I think if things are spread out in the house too much it can just be clutter,” said Meyer, “but if they’re grouped for some greater purpose they’re more noticeable and they tell more of a story.”
But the designer in Meyer won’t let her rest, won’t let her leave the rooms alone, keeping this home as changeable as its views.
