One of life's joys is discovering that appearances don't always tell the full story. Particularly in the South, even the most genteel of façades can mask a colorful past. Such is the case with this 29-year-old saltbox in one of Atlanta’s most prosperous neighborhoods of white-columned, traditional brick houses. Anyone strolling by would find it hard to believe that one of the home’s prominent owners fled from the FBI. Another vanished in the night, never to reappear. A third male homeowner was found in the attic, dead of a heart attack and dressed like a woman.and dressed like a woman.

Despite the home’s scandalous past, the current owners—a lawyer-turned-entrepreneur and his artist wife—have lived there happily since 1992. In 1999, when the last of their four children left home for college, they decided to make some changes by adding a master bedroom and converting the former bedroom space into a closet suite. “That was all we were going to do,” the entrepreneur says, his tone one of faintly grieved amusement.

Two of the owners’ favorite Art Deco pieces in their vast collection are the master suite’s Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann–designed “his and hers” chairs. “Luckily my wife and I are [built] like a woman and a man, so we fit into them nicely,” says the entrepreneur. The sheers and velvet draperies are pale celadon, as are the walls. (Click image to enlarge)

“That was all we were going to do,” the entrepreneur says, his tone one of faintly grieved amusement.

The couple ended up renovating the entire house. They streamlined the exterior with cream-colored stucco and black steel-trimmed windows to give it a contemporary look. They also incorporated a media room, automated the home with a scene-setting Lutron Homeworks Interactive lighting system and such smart-home components as motorized draperies and an integrated audiovisual system. Not stopping there, the collector traveled to New York and Paris with interior designer Bill Peace, of Atlanta’s Peace Design, to shop for the finest museum-quality Art Deco furniture.

However sophisticated the home’s interior may be, there’s something playful about Art Deco. And the owner’s extensive collections of French cigarette lighters, silver cocktail shakers and American radios add to the feeling that this is a home to thoroughly enjoy, not just to admire.

“I told Bill from the start that I didn’t want to buy incredibly expensive pieces of furniture that were going to fall apart, because I want people to use [them],” the entrepreneur says.
The project wouldn’t be what it is today if the house had not turned out to be as unpredictable as its previous owners. For the entrepreneur, part of the excitement of the renovation was everything that went wrong. “If we had not found problems, we would have put a room on. [It] would have been a lovely room,” he explains. “But this whole [project] would never have come to pass.”

In the library, a walnut Art Deco pedestal shows off pieces from the homeowners’ silver collection. A Picasso lithograph—one of two in the room—is framed in silver leaf; a Deco sconce is positioned to the left. The period Deco table was wired for the TV without drilling holes. “We just pulled it apart,” says the owner, a lawyer-turned-entrepreneur who nicknamed himself Gadget Man. (Click image to enlarge)

The project wouldn’t be what it is today if the house had not turned out to be as unpredictable as its previous owners. For the entrepreneur, part of the excitement of the renovation was everything that went wrong. “If we had not found problems, we would have put a room on. [It] would have been a lovely room,” he explains. “But this whole [project] would never have come to pass.”

The revelation that the home possessed an unstable foundation came when the last carpenter was wrapping up some finishing work. Upon noticing that the home’s wooden sill plate—part of the frame that rests above the concrete slab foundation—had rotted, he told the homeowners that their best option was to raze the house and rebuild. But the couple did not fancy a teardown, much less the construction of a 15,000-square-foot McMansion. “My wife calls them pretenders to the throne,” the entrepreneur says.

Instead, they decided to renovate their approximately 5,000-square-foot house. “It’s nice to do a house that’s scaled for two people,” says an approving Peace, who enjoyed working on his first Art Deco project. In the end, more than 100 craftspeople were employed to complete the project; more than a dozen shopping trips for furnishings were also made.

To repair the home’s damaged foundation, contractors raised the structure several feet above ground. But when the exterior stucco cracked in the process, the homeowners uncovered a bizarre plumbing system. As they started studying the home’s infrastructure more closely, they discovered much more, including a fireplace that was not even close to code. What should have taken a few months of repair work turned into three years of renovation, and inspired transformation of the interior from an eclectic design incorporating traditional and contemporary pieces to Art Deco. (Click image to enlarge)

“My mother used to say that every crisis is an opportunity,” the entrepreneur says. “This definitely turned into an op- portunity. If you’re familiar with The Money Pit, this project made it look like nothing.”

Now the terrace level is awash in warm, natural tones; the second level revolves around shades of green. (The third floor, which originally housed the children’s bedrooms, has not been renovated and is reserved for guests.) The curves of the elegant, predominantly French furniture soften the home’s sleek, modern design. The interior designer also created several custom pieces—some showcase the entrepreneur’s Art Deco objects—to harmonize with the period furniture.

More than 2,000 of the entrepreneur’s silver, gold and enamel cigarette lighters, all of which date from 1920 to 1940, now reside in their own lacquered cabinet in a vestibule outside the media room. “We call it the puzzle wall,” the entre- preneur says, alluding to the cabinetry’s drawers of varying scales, all lined with gray fabric designed to prevent tarnish. “It’s almost like a Mondrian painting.”

Inside the surround sound–equipped media room—a    surprisingly small space at 12 feet by 8 feet—a gray-beige cotton chenille throw and leather accent pillows cover the built-in banquette. Peace designed the seating to complement the leather-topped coffee table made of makassar ebony—a wood commonly used in Art Deco designs—as well as the walnut cabinetry that cleverly conceals the 42-inch Sony plasma TV.

“It’s probably the best example of our not following the pack with pretentiousness,” says the entrepreneur about the room’s relatively small size, pointing out that it seats 10 comfortably for movie viewing.

The entrepreneur’s wife, an artist, conferred with Atlanta landscape architect Paige Shaw to design and incorporate the walled Zen garden. The bamboo and gently trickling waterfalls are visible from the master bedroom’s bath. (Click image to enlarge)

On the other side of the media room’s open fireplace, which was added during construction, is the entrepreneur’s office. He works here at an Art Deco mahogany and ivory desk (circa 1930), his radio collection in sight on walnut shelving, which is also a custom Peace design.Beyond the office and media room, where the collector keeps current on stocks and plays video games, is the first-floor library. Here the homeowners spend most of their time. A customized period Deco table conceals the wiring for the 15-inch Sony flat-screen TV that rests on the tabletop. A dark walnut sofa upholstered in muted green cotton chenille, and a ma-hogany club chair in a lighter shade of velvet round out the sleek yet comfortable space.  Wool and suede cover the walls. “It’s a very quiet room because of the fabric walls,” the entrepreneur says. “There’s no clickity-clack.” Two large equipment racks, which contain the home’s whole-house automation system and audiovisual sources, are concealed behind a door.

“The owners wanted the TiVo recorder in the main equipment rack to be [accessible to] multiple televisions throughout the house,” says custom installer Drew Bardagjy of Atlanta’s Ultimate Theater Systems, a division of  Wagner Group. “We had to be able to control that from multiple areas and send the video and audio signals to those areas. That was accomplished via an AMX Landmark system.”

The expanded master suite at the end of a makassar ebony–paneled corridor also features fine Art Deco furnishings. The focal point is a curved, natural mahogany cabinet that Peace tracked down in Paris. Other finds include a Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann makassar ebony table and his and hers chairs, one straight-backed and one curved. Lighting, draperies, audio and video are controlled via AMX touchscreens, two of which tuck neatly into the master bedroom’s end tables. (Click image to enlarge)

Says Bardagjy about the challenge of integrating automation into such a house:  “It’s designed beautifully, and we wanted to make minimal intrusion.”
 
Though the house is a work of art, the owner—who jokes that he dings every new car he buys with a rubber hammer so that he can stop worrying about it—insists that he and his wife are not overly cautious with their possessions. (Click image to enlarge)

“I have to say there are drink rings here and there,” he says. “Someday, someone’s going to take this furniture and refinish it and the drink marks will be gone. But now, it’s really part and parcel of our life. I’m completely content with the result.”