Inn renovation creating ‘presence:’ Povlin
Lee Ingram, architect with Brewer Ingram Fuller Architects Inc., presented the recommended exterior color scheme for renovated Campbell Station Inn to Farragut Board of Mayor and Aldermen during a Board workshop Thursday, Sept. 13.
“It’s looking great,” Vice Mayor Louise Povlin said about the restoration so far. “When you drive by it looks like a stable building.
“It has a presence now,” she added. “I’m thrilled.”
“It feels a lot more solid inside, too,” said Lee Ingram, architect with Brewer Ingram Fuller Architects Inc.
The brick on the entire house has been repointed and a new roof will be installed this fall, Ingram said.
“The cinderblock building’s gone,” Alderman Ron Pinchok said.
Ingram recommended using a buff color on the arches above the windows and on the portico over the porch, green on the window trim and a darker green on the shutters, which would be added later.
“Our agreement didn’t include support conservation services, where you would hire a conservator to come in and actually do microscopic analysis of paint, wallpapers and things,” Ingram said.
“This is a stabilization phase, he added. ”(The analysis) could still be done — especially inside — but we had to come up with something as a basis for a color scheme on the outside.
“We were curious about it historically, what they would have on the windows and other elements of the building,” Ingram said.
As such, his team did scrapings of the existing paint on the windows and shutters before they were restored and found mostly layers of a buff color. However, under all those layers, there was an interesting green color, he said.
“We know that green was likely the very first ready-mix color available in oil paint right after the Civil War,” Ingram added.
However, “We think the green happened closer to the 1880s. The Victorian colors were becoming popular at that time,” he said.
Architects found the shutters originally were a darker green than the window trim.
Still, Ingram said he thinks the predominate color was buff.
Board members also discussed the roof’s restoration. Ingram recommended a metal roof, which would still be in line with the building’s history, but he added the original roof probably was a hand-split shake roof, which would require more maintenance.
Farragut resident Robert “Robin” Hill said he would like to see the original roof restored.
“We put a lot of money in it because it had an alleged history,” Hill said. “It seems we wouldn’t be telling the full story if we don’t bring it back to the original.”
The Town purchased Campbell Station Inn and surrounding 2.26 acres in 2012 because of the site’s history and location.
Completion of the interior and exterior repairs are expected by the end of December.
Plans for Phase 3 renovations — creation of an adjacent park, construction of a restroom facility and the addition of two driveway connections to Village Green Shopping Center — currently are in the design phase.
