Home of John and Meredith Heimburger * Sponsored by Bistro La Bon
Special Note: This home will not be open during the first hour on Saturday (10-11am). Also, there will be no parking on Peppercorn Lane. Please park on Belvedere Ave. Cruise Carts will be available for anyone that needs assistance getting to the home.
When John and Meredith purchased this new construction transitional house in 2013, they encountered the
usual delays; the completion took six months longer than anticipated but was well worth the wait.
During the building phase, they were able to make alterations to the floor plan that fit their family’s needs. For example, the wall between the master suite and nursery was removed so that John and Meredith could access the baby through a “secret passage” without having to go out into the living areas of the house – great privacy when lots of out-of-town family was visiting right after baby Ansel’s birth. Thirteen months old now, Ansel has a delightful play space at the top of the stairs, which Meredith designed with lots of color—green-striped rug, orange poof, and yellow, red and orange pillows. This will likely become a study when children no longer need a playroom. But for now, there are toys everywhere; Meredith, who hates clutter, is thrilled to have an area where she can throw all those toys. She says the area will be tidied up for the tour, but you should know it’s not usually that neat and normally looks like a color explosion.
This home is the definition of an open floor plan—entryway, kitchen, living and dining rooms and screened porch all connect directly. The Heimburgers leave the porch open nearly full time when the weather is nice. They love to entertain and Meredith loves that fact that they can both be together cooking and serving drinks while guests congregate around the kitchen island or dining table, watching a game on the living room tv—and they can hear birds and feel the breeze blowing in from outside—all
in “one room!” The screened porch is another of the changes made to the original design; it was drawn as a small open-air deck right off the back door, and it is now over 350 square feet of outdoor living space that also serves as Ansel’s huge “playpen.”
John and Meredith treasure the framed hand-stitched baby bibs displayed in Ansel’s bedroom; they were a gift to Ansel’s paternal grandfather from his aunt even before his birth. While the house is quite contemporary otherwise, they fit perfectly in the more traditional nursery. Also note the custom-made “live edge” dining table, an inspiration from the Wooden Vine restaurant near their previous uptown condo. With only four months to furnish their home before Ansel was born, Meredith relied on her friend Pryor Rayburn who runs the Art Salon; all but one piece of NC art was found at one of her shows. And the other, Meredith discovered later, is by a childhood acquaintance Caroline Wright, who still lives in Austin where they grew up. Though Meredith plans to spend more time cultivating a collection, she knows that she and John will have plenty of time to do so in the years to come.