Featured Homes
Permanent Vacation
A Northland family lives a serene life daily surrounded by coastal decor in their Dutch Colonial home.
BY
Andrea Darr
PHOTOGRAPHY
Alistair Tutton













A tree is to be blamed — or thanked — for the situation Paul and Jody Barker found themselves in after a severe storm damaged and ultimately felled it in 2006. The Northland couple had a shady yard before losing the 200-year-old oak, and without its wide canopy, they lost every plant under it that needed its cool protection. Transforming their
landscaping scheme from shade to sun meant they needed new ideas, but their search took them in a completely unexpected direction. They happened upon the HBA’s Spring Homes Tour, where they became enchanted with a Dutch Colonial at The Preserve at Shoal Creek Valley.

“It reminded us of beach houses we’ve stayed at,” Jody says. “It’s a place to kick off your shoes and sit on a chair without worrying about wrinkling it.” The couple, plus kids Matt and Katie, both in college, had collected years of memories staying in rented homes instead of hotels when they vacationed.

The house wasn’t finished yet, but Paul and Jody saw a blank palette for their creativity. They talked in the car on the way home, took the kids for a look then called a friend in real estate that night. It was theirs just like that.

Some people don’t know how to react to the building and call it “the barn house.” Its cedar-shake siding and gambrel roof put it among the few of its kind in town. “A lot of people stop and ask questions,” Paul says. “They recognize it as something they’ve seen before, but it’s still unfamiliar to them.” Jody says the whale weather vane atop the cupola is the signature piece: “It belongs with this house.” 

Inside, the home is laid out symmetrically, with a center hall dividing the house in half. “Everything flows so well; it all makes sense,” Jody comments. It also spills into outdoor spaces. When the couple made the offer, they requested a pergola be built on the back. They also purchased the lot behind the house, where they now have a second pergola and a formal garden. “It insulates and balances the look and feel of the house,” Paul explains.

Their previous home, an older, smaller Cape Cod, featured a bedroom decorated in a beach theme, a style they extended throughout the new house, careful not to let it become kitschy. “There’s a fine line between tasteful and tacky,” Jody says. “We’re trying very hard not to be tacky.”

They achieved simplicity in decor with select items — rattan furniture, a few coral lamps and that infamous tree turned into a dining room table. A neutral palette keeps everything looking fresh, while windows covered only by half shutters bounce light throughout the house. Wall paneling in the dining room adds cottage detail — and a ledge for display. Opaque glass tiles in the master bathroom look like they washed up on shore.

The final design decisions were the easiest to make. More difficult was finding the appropriate ornamentation. Boxes of “campy” items like sailboats, surfboards and storefront signs arrived at their doorstep for months, mostly to furnish the back hall like a boardwalk. “You have to have an eye for editing; there’s a lot of bad stuff out there,” Paul says. But he made sure to include special family items, such as bottles of sand from different beaches, a family heirloom china cabinet filled with seashells, and a journal he made in Hawaii with family pictures and notes left out on a hall table. “We bring our trips and travels home with us,” he says.

The informal setting suits the Barkers’ casual lifestyle and particularly Paul’s recent retirement from Hallmark. After spending 28 years in a corporate environment, he simply walks upstairs to his studio to paint and sculpt as he has time to work daily, not just on weekends anymore. The lower level of the house features many of his completed works, mostly realist pieces capturing the likeness of people.

The Barkers live life at the pace most of us would prefer, but they don’t mind everyone else bustling around — if they listen really hard, off in the distance, Highway 152 sounds a little bit like the ocean.