After living in Manhattan for 25 years, designer Jenny Keenan‘s clients decided they were ready for a change of pace, so they made the beach town of Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina their full-time home. They turned to Keenan to create an informal elegance that would infuse a relaxed feel, but also transfer some of the layered coziness to which they were accustomed. Keenan gave the interiors a Lowcountry-meets-British Colonial air, repurposing furnishing and mixing family portraits from the former house with a fresh tropical style.
“It’s not a vacation house. They live here year-round and needed a feeling of permanence,” Keenan explains. “But this is definitely not a chateau at the beach.” The home is personal and feels very much at ease, which makes it fit in well on the island. Photography by J. Savage Gibson and captions by Mimi Read for Coastal Living…
Collections reign in the living room, where a foursome of French garden prints and a sweetgrass basket from a local weaver hang above an assemblage of antique ginger jars. A selection of marine curiosities is displayed in a simple acrylic trunk. The chair is upholstered in China Seas Bali Hai by Quadrille.
Even the owners’ cherished 19th-century, marble-topped console with gilt carvings found a place in the beach house: Keenan flanked it with a pair of wicker hall chairs by Soane Britain, and hung a whimsical new shell mirror above it.
Tropical de Gournay wall panels depicting an old island church elevate the sunny dining nook off the entrance hall. Suzanne Allen Studio created the custom painted floor pattern.
The island is painted Hale Navy by Benjamin Moore and topped with Calacatta Arni marble.
Keenan paired an upholstered banquette by Verellen with powder-coated aluminum outdoor chairs at the breakfast table.
Aqua trellis wallpaper from Quadrille and a carved four-poster bed by Oscar de la Renta keep the palette light in the second-floor master bedroom.
The first-floor bedroom is a throwback to the style of older guesthouses in the Caribbean, with a leafy, tropical fabric by Jasper, paisley wallpaper in natural tones by China Seas, and a faux bamboo bed by Rooms & Gardens in Santa Barbara.
The custom vanity in one master bath is maple with bamboo detailing.
In this guest bedroom, cockatoo pillows (in fabric by Bob Collins & Sons) and tangerine wallpaper on the ceiling give the room seriously sunny vibes, while bamboo headboards in a deep navy give the room some much-needed weight and gravitas.
Splendid patterns, plenty of texture, and straight-off-the-beach neutrals make a pretty trio in this warm, welcoming guest room (decked out in wallpaper by Quadrille). Plus, the collected, curated look of the bedding makes the room feel like a far-flung island retreat within the house.
Architect Beau Clowney designed a cozy pavilion—with a vaulted cedar-shingle roof and a bank of bifold shutters—steps from the Atlantic.
Clowney blended elements gleaned from Caribbean architecture, including a rich vocabulary of shutter types, with the traditional details of Lowcountry houses: hipped roofs, exposed rafters, and breezy center hallways.
“Many of the Carolinas’ earliest settlers arrived via Barbados and other English colonies in the Caribbean,” says Clowney. “Their building traditions came with them.” One such tradition inspired the glamorously tall flourish he used to embellish this facade—a stylized, stuccoed-concrete version of the flaring staircases common in both Barbados manor homes and some of the grander downtown Charleston homes.
For additional information, please visit Coastal Living. This article appeared in the May 2017 issue.
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Loved the choice of wallpapers in the interior, especially the aqua colored wallpaper and the deep navy blue one used in the bedroom. Thanks for sharing such great interiors.