Tampa Vacation Home
An overview of our latest Florida home
One of the best parts of being luxury interior designers in Knoxville, Tennessee, is that sometimes our amazing clients purchase second homes and call on us to revitalize the interiors of those new properties. As much as we love designing homes in beautiful East Tennessee, we love any opportunity to expand our reach, especially if that happens to be near some clear, blue water. In addition to our local Knoxville projects, we also have the option to do interior design and remodeling for vacation homes. Such was the case with one of our Knoxville clients. We had worked with this family for years and had redone most of their Tennessee home, taking on a few rooms each year. When they purchased a Tampa vacation home recently, they reached out to us to bring our Rowan Hall touch, this time down in sunny Florida.
Miami Takes Tampa
The home was in a glorious location, only steps from the heart of the city and the Tampa Riverwalk. That area is the focal point of the downtown landscape, within walking distance of the city’s awesome restaurants, arts scene and cultural events. This would be a great place for the family to get away for the weekend from time to time. Another advantage of them buying there was the abundance of inexpensive flights from Knoxville to Tampa, plus the fact that they had friends and family nearby.
Alfie used to tease the wife about how her style was so “Miami.” She loves bling and bold choices was always wanting her interior style to be a little more contemporary, despite the fact that their Knoxville home was more on the traditional side. Fortunately, we were able to bring that style to some extent in remodeling the family’s new Tampa home. In particular, we were excited about having carte blanche to give everything a fresh look.
Formal living room before
Formal living room before
Before our clients even purchased the property, they called on their favorite interior designer. They sent existing photos of the home from its real estate listings and asked if we thought it would be suitable for them. Bottom line: Could we update it? Alfie could tell from the photos that the home did not match their style in the least. It was decorated in a very traditional fashion, which was not a style the family would enjoy. It was time for an update, and we knew we could make it work.
The Fun Begins
As she would typically do when working on an out-of-state project, Alfie began by flying down to Tampa and taking measurements of all the spaces. We call this our “trade day,” step three in our fifteen step interior design process. After this kickoff to the project, our Knoxville interior design team had many discussions with the clients. We made a lot of decisions when it came to selecting materials, colors and furnishings. 
Our Knoxville interior design team did most sourcing from our usual vendors. Our favorite companies can ship to anywhere in the country, so we contracted with a warehouse in Tampa to receive those orders for us. We’ve worked diligently over the years to perfect a remote process, so our clients can invest in a Rowan Hall home no matter its location. As is typical with remote projects, major pieces were shipped to the Tampa warehouse. More delicate items like custom draperies, rugs, lamps and other breakable items were delivered to our Knoxville warehouse. We made sure every item was in pristine condition, carefully loaded up the van, and headed south for install day!
A Worthy Investment
This home was in great shape and did not require a total remodel, so we focused on salvaging what was there to create a home that was more our clients’ style. For example, the floors were in fine condition as were the kitchen cabinets. Instead of replacing them, we made the decision to invest in other areas.
Kitchen before
Kitchen after
Overall, we made aesthetic changes and brightened the home significantly with a fresh coat of paint, relying primarily on neutral colors. In addition to the walls, we painted the kitchen cabinets, the ceilings, some of the floors and some of the wood molding. The most substantial thing we did architecturally was to knock out an arched niche in the dining room wall and open it up to improve the flow into the kitchen.
Dining room before
Dining room after niche opened up and paint changed
Dining room after
We also changed the lighting, getting rid of the fixtures and doing a refresh by hiring a local Tampa contractor. It was one the family already had a relationship with, and he was wonderful to work with. He was able to tell us what made sense in terms of which updates would be expensive and which would be more reasonable.
An Optical Delusion
When it came to the bathrooms, we decided that we might update them substantially at a later date. Since they were not in bad shape, we simply made cosmetic updates and fluffed them up to make the spaces look more appealing and current. We debated changing out the sink basin and mirror in the powder room because the existing was overly decorative. Instead, we kept them and hung a more traditional style of wallpaper to create a cohesive look.
Powder room before
After: powder room wallpaper
The powder room, however, did present us with an interesting challenge — a tromp de l’oeil, which is an artistic term for the optical illusion of three-dimensional space created by painting a two-dimensional surface. It was just one example of the many decorative faux paintings throughout the home. As you can see in the above photo, a recessed wall in that room served as the canvas for a faux window view of a waterfront scene. It was honestly pretty wretched.
Formal living room after paint change
Formal living room after
We found several other features of the home to be challenging. For example, we did not love the arches, the ornate staircase or the really red floors. But it also didn’t make sense to completely change them at this time because they were in good shape. Fortunately, by the time we moved some beautiful elements into those spaces, the bad elements weren’t as noticeably awful. In fact, the floors actually wound up providing good contrast to some of the cooler new colors we selected. We also tried to minimize them by utilizing sleek and clean-lined furniture.
Fun and Fabulous
Basement after
Another focal point of this project was the basement. The previous owners had used it as an office, but our clients didn’t need one. So we changed that area into a den as well as a space that could be utilized for additional sleeping. There is a bathroom downstairs, so that made a perfect place for extra accommodations.
Primary bedroom before
Primary bedroom after
You can see from the before photos that the primary bedroom was in good condition. A fresh coat of paint and a new ceiling fan were enough to make the space feel brand new. New custom window treatments in a bold fabric and pops of color made this space more exciting and gave our client that fun, contemporary style she desired.
In general, the changes we implemented also turned this makeover into an investment. The family can enjoy their vacation home for years to come. If they ever decide to sell the property, Rowan Hall has helped make smart upgrades that will set them up for success.
We’ve given you a small taste of what went into transforming this Tampa Bay vacation property, but don’t worry. We will be breaking down all the design details and sharing much more inspo from our funky Florida vacation home. Keep your eyes peeled for future posts, in which we go into more detail about what our Knoxville, TN interior designers did to freshen up each individual room.
If you’re looking for your own getaway location, Rowan Hall would love to be involved! Call our team if you’re interested in interior design and remodeling for vacation homes or remote work of your own. We can’t wait to hear from you!
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