HOME PORTRAIT
A Designing Woman
Sue Ellen Rothery
Profile by Karla Araujo
You’ve heard the old real estate adage about the three L’s of buying a home: location, location, location. But this story hinges on three L’s of a different nature: The love, longing and luck that surround a special three-acre compound in West Tisbury.
It is the story, too, of new beginnings, of following one’s heart and passion. Sue Ellen Rothery, one of the East Coast’s most prominent interior designers, trusted her instincts and recently created a new home and business on that very site.
But the story begins more than 25 years ago when shingler Warren Mead fell in love. The object of his affection was a parcel of land off Old Courthouse Road in West Tisbury that never failed to capture his eye as he walked along the quiet lane. When he learned through a friend that the three acres was to be put up for sale after having been in the same family for generations, Warren knew he had to purchase it.
Although eager to create his new home, Warren recollects that he “didn’t want to cut a tree on the new land until I was sure how I wanted everything to be.” Instead, he walked the hillside parcel for an entire year until he decided how to put a road in.
His next project was to build a tiny structure that turned into his home of sorts for the following year, adding an outhouse to make it livable. It was constructed entirely of wood salvaged from a dismantled garage in Edgartown. Over the next twenty-one years, Warren would add a main house,
guest cottage and workshop.
As he began to create his multi-dwelling compound, sisters Sue Ellen and Kyle Rothery began visiting the Island for what would become an annual vacation. Each summer, they’d rent a house together and fantasize about becoming full-time residents.
“Once we started staying up-Island, I thought how lovely it would be to live here,” Sue Ellen explains. “We both fell in love with the Vineyard.”
In the fall of 2010, Sue Ellen noticed an ad for a property in West Tisbury. When she and Kyle came for their annual visit, they arranged to see the three-acre compound complete with main house, guest cottage, workshop and storage shed.
“It was fabulous,” Sue Ellen says. “It lived up to our expectations. The property spoke to both Kyle and me. It had such charm and patina.”
The timing, in all ways, turned out to be perfect. After twenty years of joint vacations, the Rothery sisters had begun talking seriously about investing in a Vineyard home together. Kyle was nearing retirement from the insurance industry. Sue Ellen had been a successful interior designer in Connecticut for more than two decades but was ready to relocate and build a practice on the Island.
At the same time, the owners of the West Tisbury site, Warren and his wife Mary Anne Mead, decided to move back to the coast of Maine where they had met as children. They put the West Tisbury property on the market and the stars simply lined up, according to Sue Ellen.
While Warren, owner of a Vineyard company that specializes in hand-nailed shingling for roofs and siding since 1970, thought he was relocating, it turns out the Island wasn’t ready to let him go. “When I told my guys I was planning to move to Maine, they decided they wanted to keep working, so I’m still shingling on the Vineyard.”
Of some comfort to the Meads in their departure was the knowledge that the new owners of their home would lavish it with the attention and love that they had felt for it themselves. “I was prepared for a bulldozer when I thought about selling,” Warren says. “But they’ve only enhanced the property. Nothing Sue Ellen has done has been anything but a pleasant surprise. And I was particularly pleased to sell it to two sisters who will live in both houses.”
While Sue Ellen and Kyle had dreamed of owning their own property on the Island, it wasn’t until they walked the acreage and toured the structures Warren had built that they knew they’d come home. “The post and beam structures were built so soundly,” Sue Ellen explains. “Nothing creaks, even in high winds.” They loved the privacy afforded by the setting, buffered from neighbors and even from one another as Sue Ellen has opted to live in the cottage while Kyle adopted the main house as her own.
“It was just serendipity,” Sue Ellen says, detailing the smooth process that led the Rotherys to take possession of the compound. “Everything moved so smoothly,” she says, including the actual move itself, coordinated by Island trucker extraordinaire, Trip Barnes, owner of Clarence A. Barnes Moving & Storage of Vineyard Haven, for more than fifty years. “He did an amazing job,” Sue Ellen says, describing his retrieval of antiques, art and collectibles from multiple locations.
While Kyle finishes out the last few months of her career, Sue Ellen is busy preparing the property for the beginning of their new life as year-round residents of the Island. She spent her first winter here and marvels at the welcome she received. Along with Isabel, her six-year-old wire-haired dachshund, and Zoe, her 14-year-old tabby cat, they are simply, as she puts it, “delighted.”
And, while the sisters love everything about the property, they’ve been hard at work making it feel like their own. West Tisbury painter Paul Thurlow has been adding color to the walls, “honoring the pine beams,” Sue Ellen explains. Color is crucial to her vision in any home she decorates. “Choosing color is of the utmost importance,” she states emphatically. “It’s so important. I love color. It’s the foundation. It’s driven by who people are, their palette, along with the space and the exposure.”
They plan to make small changes, keeping the character of the buildings that Warren so meticulously crafted. Sue Ellen speaks rapturously of the antique windows and doors, the clawfoot tub, vintage stove, old sink and other treasures that Warren incorporated into each structure. She and Kyle have added furniture and decorative accessories gathered from their previous homes, as well as from estate sales and former decorator show houses. They have been amazed at how seamlessly the furnishings have fit into their new home and complement the signature Vineyard post and beam architecture.
“It’s my art,” Sue Ellen explains. “I bring a fresh vision – a fresh eye – to this wonderful property and, I hope, to other people’s homes on the Island.”
While Kyle wraps up her life on the mainland, Sue Ellen has enthusiastically taken charge of preparing the compound for their next chapter. Her design studio, the former workshop, is newly whitewashed and outfitted for business. The cottage will undergo a modest addition. Window treatments have been hung where needed. The furniture, rugs, art and bric-a-brac look as if they’ve been in place for decades.
Sue Ellen’s design philosophy is clearly reflected in each room: classical simplicity, clean lines and strong functionality. “Graceful homes, beautiful rooms consist of a balance of texture, scale, color and good editing,” she says. “It’s my job to create inviting, comfortable, chic, interesting places.” When asked about her style, she is quick to explain that it is dictated by the space and its inhabitants. “It’s up to me to intuit the space and to know the humans, to bring their essence to it.”
Just as Warren spent time feeling the land before he took down a single tree, Sue Ellen slept on an air mattress in the main house for days before making any alterations. “The space talks to you,” she says succinctly.
She is excited at the prospect of utilizing Island resources for both her home and those of her clients. “Local sourcing is a priority. If I can find it here, that’s my route. And there’s so much here.”
A long-time advocate of green products, she also plans to continue that practice in her new projects. “I’ve been doing green all along,” she says. “I’m aware of the process items go through to get here. How fabric is processed and rugs are produced. It’s very important that we do the best we can.” A proponent of quality furniture, Sue Ellen is a firm believer that well-made items live through generations. “Reupholster, repurpose,” she urges. “Don’t reject. Quality furnishings get passed down and don’t end up as trash in our landfills.”
Like the best love stories, this one has a happy ending. Warren enjoys his forays to the Vineyard from his beloved new farm in Maine and plans to continue his business here indefinitely. Along the way, he says he’s learned an important lesson: “I realized through coming back that Martha’s Vineyard will always be my home. The house wasn’t my home. The whole Island is.”
Sue Ellen’s design studio is up and running, her first client project well under way. She and Kyle look forward to their first summer as full-time residents, welcoming their youngest sister, Dee Dee, and her family for frequent visits. According to Sue Ellen, they see themselves not only as inhabitants of the three acres they now call home, but as stewards as well.
“We’re the next caretakers of the property,” she says. “We’re here to preserve the magic.”
For more information on Sue Ellen Rothery’s interior design practice, call or click: sueelleninteriors.com. 508.696.5656
It is the story, too, of new beginnings, of following one’s heart and passion. Sue Ellen Rothery, one of the East Coast’s most prominent interior designers, trusted her instincts and recently created a new home and business on that very site.
But the story begins more than 25 years ago when shingler Warren Mead fell in love. The object of his affection was a parcel of land off Old Courthouse Road in West Tisbury that never failed to capture his eye as he walked along the quiet lane. When he learned through a friend that the three acres was to be put up for sale after having been in the same family for generations, Warren knew he had to purchase it.
Although eager to create his new home, Warren recollects that he “didn’t want to cut a tree on the new land until I was sure how I wanted everything to be.” Instead, he walked the hillside parcel for an entire year until he decided how to put a road in.
His next project was to build a tiny structure that turned into his home of sorts for the following year, adding an outhouse to make it livable. It was constructed entirely of wood salvaged from a dismantled garage in Edgartown. Over the next twenty-one years, Warren would add a main house,
guest cottage and workshop.
As he began to create his multi-dwelling compound, sisters Sue Ellen and Kyle Rothery began visiting the Island for what would become an annual vacation. Each summer, they’d rent a house together and fantasize about becoming full-time residents.
“Once we started staying up-Island, I thought how lovely it would be to live here,” Sue Ellen explains. “We both fell in love with the Vineyard.”
In the fall of 2010, Sue Ellen noticed an ad for a property in West Tisbury. When she and Kyle came for their annual visit, they arranged to see the three-acre compound complete with main house, guest cottage, workshop and storage shed.
“It was fabulous,” Sue Ellen says. “It lived up to our expectations. The property spoke to both Kyle and me. It had such charm and patina.”
The timing, in all ways, turned out to be perfect. After twenty years of joint vacations, the Rothery sisters had begun talking seriously about investing in a Vineyard home together. Kyle was nearing retirement from the insurance industry. Sue Ellen had been a successful interior designer in Connecticut for more than two decades but was ready to relocate and build a practice on the Island.
At the same time, the owners of the West Tisbury site, Warren and his wife Mary Anne Mead, decided to move back to the coast of Maine where they had met as children. They put the West Tisbury property on the market and the stars simply lined up, according to Sue Ellen.
While Warren, owner of a Vineyard company that specializes in hand-nailed shingling for roofs and siding since 1970, thought he was relocating, it turns out the Island wasn’t ready to let him go. “When I told my guys I was planning to move to Maine, they decided they wanted to keep working, so I’m still shingling on the Vineyard.”
Of some comfort to the Meads in their departure was the knowledge that the new owners of their home would lavish it with the attention and love that they had felt for it themselves. “I was prepared for a bulldozer when I thought about selling,” Warren says. “But they’ve only enhanced the property. Nothing Sue Ellen has done has been anything but a pleasant surprise. And I was particularly pleased to sell it to two sisters who will live in both houses.”
While Sue Ellen and Kyle had dreamed of owning their own property on the Island, it wasn’t until they walked the acreage and toured the structures Warren had built that they knew they’d come home. “The post and beam structures were built so soundly,” Sue Ellen explains. “Nothing creaks, even in high winds.” They loved the privacy afforded by the setting, buffered from neighbors and even from one another as Sue Ellen has opted to live in the cottage while Kyle adopted the main house as her own.
“It was just serendipity,” Sue Ellen says, detailing the smooth process that led the Rotherys to take possession of the compound. “Everything moved so smoothly,” she says, including the actual move itself, coordinated by Island trucker extraordinaire, Trip Barnes, owner of Clarence A. Barnes Moving & Storage of Vineyard Haven, for more than fifty years. “He did an amazing job,” Sue Ellen says, describing his retrieval of antiques, art and collectibles from multiple locations.
While Kyle finishes out the last few months of her career, Sue Ellen is busy preparing the property for the beginning of their new life as year-round residents of the Island. She spent her first winter here and marvels at the welcome she received. Along with Isabel, her six-year-old wire-haired dachshund, and Zoe, her 14-year-old tabby cat, they are simply, as she puts it, “delighted.”
And, while the sisters love everything about the property, they’ve been hard at work making it feel like their own. West Tisbury painter Paul Thurlow has been adding color to the walls, “honoring the pine beams,” Sue Ellen explains. Color is crucial to her vision in any home she decorates. “Choosing color is of the utmost importance,” she states emphatically. “It’s so important. I love color. It’s the foundation. It’s driven by who people are, their palette, along with the space and the exposure.”
They plan to make small changes, keeping the character of the buildings that Warren so meticulously crafted. Sue Ellen speaks rapturously of the antique windows and doors, the clawfoot tub, vintage stove, old sink and other treasures that Warren incorporated into each structure. She and Kyle have added furniture and decorative accessories gathered from their previous homes, as well as from estate sales and former decorator show houses. They have been amazed at how seamlessly the furnishings have fit into their new home and complement the signature Vineyard post and beam architecture.
“It’s my art,” Sue Ellen explains. “I bring a fresh vision – a fresh eye – to this wonderful property and, I hope, to other people’s homes on the Island.”
While Kyle wraps up her life on the mainland, Sue Ellen has enthusiastically taken charge of preparing the compound for their next chapter. Her design studio, the former workshop, is newly whitewashed and outfitted for business. The cottage will undergo a modest addition. Window treatments have been hung where needed. The furniture, rugs, art and bric-a-brac look as if they’ve been in place for decades.
Sue Ellen’s design philosophy is clearly reflected in each room: classical simplicity, clean lines and strong functionality. “Graceful homes, beautiful rooms consist of a balance of texture, scale, color and good editing,” she says. “It’s my job to create inviting, comfortable, chic, interesting places.” When asked about her style, she is quick to explain that it is dictated by the space and its inhabitants. “It’s up to me to intuit the space and to know the humans, to bring their essence to it.”
Just as Warren spent time feeling the land before he took down a single tree, Sue Ellen slept on an air mattress in the main house for days before making any alterations. “The space talks to you,” she says succinctly.
She is excited at the prospect of utilizing Island resources for both her home and those of her clients. “Local sourcing is a priority. If I can find it here, that’s my route. And there’s so much here.”
A long-time advocate of green products, she also plans to continue that practice in her new projects. “I’ve been doing green all along,” she says. “I’m aware of the process items go through to get here. How fabric is processed and rugs are produced. It’s very important that we do the best we can.” A proponent of quality furniture, Sue Ellen is a firm believer that well-made items live through generations. “Reupholster, repurpose,” she urges. “Don’t reject. Quality furnishings get passed down and don’t end up as trash in our landfills.”
Like the best love stories, this one has a happy ending. Warren enjoys his forays to the Vineyard from his beloved new farm in Maine and plans to continue his business here indefinitely. Along the way, he says he’s learned an important lesson: “I realized through coming back that Martha’s Vineyard will always be my home. The house wasn’t my home. The whole Island is.”
Sue Ellen’s design studio is up and running, her first client project well under way. She and Kyle look forward to their first summer as full-time residents, welcoming their youngest sister, Dee Dee, and her family for frequent visits. According to Sue Ellen, they see themselves not only as inhabitants of the three acres they now call home, but as stewards as well.
“We’re the next caretakers of the property,” she says. “We’re here to preserve the magic.”
For more information on Sue Ellen Rothery’s interior design practice, call or click: sueelleninteriors.com. 508.696.5656