Indianapolis Monthly Oct. 2022 Home of the Month

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Photography by T ON Y VA L A I N I S

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Opposite: A vivid floral still life is juxtaposed with moody navy paint, Valspar’s Night View. This page: A spare room was transformed into a library with 19th century–inspired wallpaper and custom flooring and shelving.

Time After Time A design enthusiast combines the romanticism of period dramas with a vibrant, timeless aesthetic to set her suburban home apart.

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O T V E RY far past Fishers, backed up against a cornfield, stands an august house of French chateau style. Inside, the home does feel exquisitely of a bygone era, but with a surprisingly contemporary air about it. It’s not unlike how Bridgerton reimagines Regency England in candy colors.

Traditional sitting-room chairs masquerade in rich velvet. Vivid repetitious patterns stand in for damask wallpaper. European wall treatments and paneling get splashes of Pantone’s 2022 color of the year (periwinkle). A classic bust has a houseplant sticking out of it, almost defiantly.

It’s easy to forget it’s your typical suburban house built in the 1990s. And that’s exactly what Sara Davis, owner and the designer behind the blog Sincerely, Sara D wants. Of the 40 homes in her tract, “ours is the only one that looks timeless, like it could have been built six months or 100 years ago,” she says.

“Many of the others haven’t been updated inside, so they feel stuck in the ’90s.” From the beginning, she strove to set her home apart in the Pendleton subdivision.

Her first step was elevating the home’s curb appeal. The exterior was constructed in a classic style, so Davis leaned into that, redoing much of the landscaping to be symmetrical. Along the walkway leading up to her front door, she planted boxwood

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“Our home looks timeless, like it could have been built six months or 100 years ago.”

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Above: The kitchen strikes both modern and homey notes. Right: Davis went with a simple white table and black chairs in the breakfast nook, drawing attention to the wall art and light fixture.

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“Too many people seem to make home design decisions based on what’s popular, whether the masses will like it.”

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PROCESS PHOTO COURTESY SARA DAVIS

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Clockwise from left: The 4,567-squarefoot home was built in 1998; the living room exhibits the Regency view that symmetry eases conversation; Davis installing French-style paneling; her grandma’s chandelier and a custom table are focal points in the finished dining room.

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them, noting the deepness makes the room feel more dramatic. “I guess we can double up the books,” she laughs.

The floor in the library is Carrara honed marble, a soft stone that may seem an odd choice for the home of a busy family. But

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Davis loved it, noting marble is pretty much standard in historic homes. “It’s beautiful, and adds so much interest,” she says. Davis decided to go with it since the library doesn’t see much foot traffic. “I laid that marble tile myself. My ladder deserved better than the carpeting that had been in there.”

The wallpaper—Davis says it was easy to hang—is of a sweeping nature scene, a nod to the 19th century, the golden age of pastoral landscape paintings. “This is absolutely something you would have seen in an older home’s library.” Many designers these days urge their clients to locate a color in a room and attempt to match it in other areas of the same room for consistency, notes Davis. But she has other ideas, marrying wispy grays, bold robin’s egg, and muted baby blue here.

Davis is prone to repainting a room again and again in pursuit of new color twists like that. She smiles, then shares a sudden realization. “I may need to start doing watercolor paintings, because we’re running out of square footage.”

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shrubs for their long-lasting greenery, then fresh for many years to come. (Davis made incorporated topiaries to shape over time. the portraits depicting each of her children.)

While Davis admires the work of her “I see people letting go of their dinfellow home design content creators, she ing rooms, but I like the idea of having a doesn’t emulate it. “If you look at the homes separate space for family dinners.” Davis on Pinterest, it’s a sea of neutrals, which embraces rooms with a dedicated purisn’t bad. They can be beautiful,” she says. pose, unusual in our open-concept world.

“But I don’t look to other Although leisurely weekday design bloggers. Rather, I family meals might be few, tour old homes. Too many Davis and her husband, Davis gets many of people seem to make home Steve, enjoy taking dinner in her design ideas design decisions based on the dining room with their from watching period what’s popular, whether three young children withpieces, including Bridgerton and the masses will like it.” out the distraction of TV. “It Persuasion. Her dining With the landscaping may sound old-school,” she table was directly done, she turned to transdemurs. “But we enjoy our inspired by the one forming the kitchen. While family time together.” the Crawleys sup at in Downton Abbey. she tries to avoid flash-andAnother dedicated space gone trends, she works that Davis created was the to enfold looks she really library. Few homes built loves. For instance, she in the 1990s have a library, chose the clean gleam of white subway tile, but for Davis, it was a must. “Every home despite its popularity. But she grounded it I’ve toured has a library. It was the only with provincial fixtures, such as the Shakerentertainment room back in those days,” she style cabinetry, a smaller farmhouse sink, explains. Davis assembled and stained the and vintage-style faucets. Victorian-variety ladder herself. A local woodworker built the silhouettes hanging nearby also bring in a shelves in his shop. He made them deeper classic touch, ensuring the kitchen will feel than Davis anticipated, but now, she likes

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Far left: “I love the timeless look of the exterior,” says Davis.

“I try to bring that inside.” Top: Soft green was a color favored

by Victorians. Davis draws inspiration from the era. Near left: Davis likes patterned wallpaper, but reserves the busiest prints for accent walls.

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