IPC Holiday House Tour to feature four Mountain Brook homes
Four of Mountain Brook’s most beautiful homes will open their doors for the holidays as a part of the 66th Independent Presbyterian Church’s Holiday House Tour.
The tour – to take place on Saturday, Dec. 12 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday, Dec. 13 from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. – will feature stops at four Mountain Brook homes and the church itself, located at 3100 Highland Avenue. The event culminates the yearlong centennial celebration of the IPC, founded in 1915.
“It’s an annual holiday tradition for many people in our community,” publicity chair Jennifer Cope said. “We always have gorgeous homes with fabulous decorations covering a variety of styles.”
Tickets can be purchased at IPC-USA.org/holiday-house or by stopping by the church reception desk during business hours. Tickets are also available at the homes and at IPC during the hours of the tour. Tickets are $30, and proceeds help fund the Summer Learning Program at the Children’s Fresh Air Farm. Around 80 third through fifth graders attend the program, which addresses challenges faced by disadvantaged children such as summer learning loss and nutritional deficiencies.
“There are many generous homeowners in Birmingham that have willingly opened their homes for this fundraiser,” Cope said.
Meet this year’s homeowners right here before you see their homes on the tour.
The Jolly Home--2805 Shook Hill Circle
With a last name like Jolly, it’s easy to get in the holiday spirit.
And Mary Elaine Jolly is. Her family’s Christmas card reads “Just Be Jolly.” She ordered pillows this year with her last name on it – perfect for Christmas. And on her Christmas tree, upside down candy canes – which transform into the letter J – hang from the branches. She’s also opening her doors at 2805 Shook Hill Circle for the IPC Holiday House Tour, where visitors can enjoy the refined French décor and its holiday trimmings.
Jolly and her family attend St. Luke’s but got involved with the IPC tour through a sorority sister of Jolly’s, Paige Albright, who is a member at IPC. Jolly loves home décor and interiors, she said, so she was happy to get behind the cause.
Jolly, her husband Robert, an architect, and an interior designer designed the home from the ground up in 2006. Jolly used the same interior designer, Tricia Willis, that her parents used, and the home’s feel still suits the family nine years later.
“We are proud of it,” Jolly said.
The décor in the home is the same since the Jollys moved in – Jolly loves French antiques and many of the pieces in her home reflect that. She has been very selective in the décor she adds, she said, preferring to add piece by piece, even if it takes years.
“Everything is the same since 2006, but we keep layering and adding,” she said. “I’d rather have nothing than just have something to get by.”
Her favorite room in the home is the screened-in porch, complete with a fireplace.
“I love our porch, and I didn’t realize how much I’d like it until we had it,” Jolly said. “My husband and I spend time out there.”
Her three children, ages 11 to 15, enjoy what Jolly deems to be the most unique room in the house – a room over the garage that is a combination game room, playroom, and den.
“It was kind of an afterthought,” she said. “Our teenagers hang out there. It’s easy to put them up there with pizza – we know that they are safe.”
Visitors can also catch glimpses of Jolly’s Floridian upbringing – coral and shell botanicals are in the powder room, and there is a sign from Miracle Strip Amusement Park in Panama City Beach, Florida, which her father owned.
Jolly is proud of her home year-round, but especially this time of year.
“I love the house when it is decorated for Christmas,” she said.
The Thomson Home--3121 Brookwood Road
Good things come to those who wait – even your dream home.
Kathy Thomson had loved the house at 3121 Brookwood Road since she was a student at Mountain Brook High School.
“I loved the feel of it, the setting – it was a warm house, homey and comfortable,” she said. “I loved the architecture and the big front porch.”
When Kathy and her husband Tommy moved back to Birmingham from Nashville around 1999 or 2000, Kathy went to the house she always loved and left a note in their mailbox that said “if you ever move, give me a call.” The homeowner did call Kathy – but said only that her family had no plans to move. If they ever did, she said, she would call.
Flash forward to February 2013 – the phone rang. The homeowner and her family were moving out of state, she said – were the Thomsons still interested?
In the fall of 2013, the house was theirs.
Now that the home she admired for years is hers, Kathy calls the home easy to live in – a comfortable, informal home. Tommy loves its old-fashioned comfort and charm, its warmth, traditional features – and its impressive front yard.
It was built in 1959 by Victor Hanson, the former publisher of The Birmingham News. The Thomsons are its third owners. The couple are members of IPC, and sprinklings of the church are all over the home – the same architecture firm, Warren, Knight, and Davis, designed both the Thomson home and the church. Debbie Simmons, a fellow IPC member, did the renovations on the home for the Thomsons. There is a cross at the front door of the home made from the slate roof of the church. Kathy has been involved with the IPC Holiday House Tour for years – and the Thomsons love its mission.
“The underlying mission is to raise money for the church,” Tommy said. “It all supports the Children’s Fresh Air Farm. Our church members are always focused on service, and this is our biggest fundraiser.”
Visitors to the Thomson home will enjoy the special touches in the home – hidden closets in the foyer, the built-in China cabinet, and paintings in the home of the Mississippi Delta, where Kathy’s family owns property, and of Africa, honoring Tommy’s mission trip work at hospitals in Kenya and Zambia. The paintings of Africa hang in the study – Tommy’s favorite room. He loves the fireplace and the leather chairs.
“It’s cozy and full of bookshelves,” he said. “We spend a lot of time here, and it overlooks the front yard.”
Kathy’s favorite room is the screened-in porch with its comfortable chairs.
The Thomsons updated the home when they moved into it, but kept the original living room, molding, and fireplace mantel. The home also features a unique breezeway that connects the main home to a guest bedroom and bathroom above the garage. The home has plenty of room for the Thomsons and their two children – a daughter who is a student at the College of Charleston, and a son who is a student at Mountain Brook High School.
The home will be decorated with greenery from their son’s Boy Scout troop’s greenery sale, including a white-lit wreath that will adorn the home’s side chimney. The Thomsons will have two Christmas trees – a formal tree and a family tree.
At the holidays, and always, the home is a fulfillment of years of admiration on Kathy’s part.
“I do love it,” she said. “It’s an easy house to live in.”
The Howland Home--2801 Shook Hill Circle
The Howlands were not looking to move. Not until Mary Beth Howland got a call from her sorority sister and realtor Lucy Parker, anyway.
Parker told Howland and her husband, Rob, to get over to 2801 Shook Hill Circle – and the Howlands were wowed.
“We said ‘wow, let’s do it,’” Howland said. “We never wanted to move. My husband was like ‘that’s what you get for having a friend that’s a realtor!’”
This will be the Howlands’ first Christmas in their home – after closing on it in April and spending much of the summer at their new beach house in Alys Beach, Florida, Howland said she really only feels as though she’s been living there for a few months.
“Once school got back in August, we got into the groove,” she said.
Howland got involved with the IPC Holiday House Tour through decorator Lisa Flake. She asked if Howland was interested in doing the tour, and she and her husband – who attend Our Lady of Sorrows with their three children, ages 10 to 16 – eagerly jumped on board.
“They have made it so easy,” Howland said. “They’ve asked for nothing but to supply the house.”
The Howlands usually have a busy go of it around holiday decorating season – right after Thanksgiving is Mary Louise, their oldest child’s, birthday on December 1, and, as avid Crimson Tide fans, they usually spend the first weekend in December at the SEC championship. Visitors can expect some nontraditional decorations when they visit – especially in daughters Mary Louise and Anna Claire’s rooms.
“It will be off the traditional cuff, especially with the girls’ rooms,” Howland said. “The girls’ rooms will be fun.”
The main room of the home will be decorated with ample amounts of gold, Howland said. It is Howland and her husband’s favorite room in the home.
“It’s our gathering spot,” she said.
Though the home is expansive on the outside, Howland said she loves that the interior floor plan doesn’t make the house feel too big.
“It looks so huge on the outside, but when you walk in there are large rooms, so it doesn’t feel like you’re lost,” she said. “The house is not overpowering – it’s more comfortable.”
The home is simple, clean, and livable, she said – it has to be.
“We have kids and dogs that follow us around everywhere,” Howland said. “It’s not fancy.”
There is plenty of room for the Howlands and their three children to entertain friends, including a backyard that feels like a resort – complete with a pool and stunning landscaping.
“It feels like we’re on vacation, the outside especially,” Howland said. “It’s so quiet, peaceful and serene. We love living here.”
The Roth Home--3241 Dell Road
Creativity runs through the rafters of the Roth home.
Before Kathleen Roth, her husband, David, and their two children moved in to 3241 Dell Road in the summer of 2013, the home was owned by renowned children’s portrait photographer Barbara Harbin and her husband, Robin.
“They lived here for about 30 years and photographed multiple generations here,” Roth said.
The garden in the Roths’ backyard was the backdrop for many a children’s portrait. There is no longer a photography studio in the home, but creativity still abounds – Roth has her own letterpress business that she runs out of her own studio at the home.
“I’m following in her creative manner,” she said. “It’s obviously not the same craft, but I feel I can be creative here knowing she’d been creative here all of these years.”
Roth does Christmas cards, invitations and stationary – but cut off business in September to start gearing up for the IPC Holiday House Tour. She had worked the tour before – The Roths are members of IPC – but it wasn’t until a visit from Paige Albright in the spring that the Roth home was a stop on the route.
“Paige called and said ‘are you at home? I’ll be there in five minutes,’” Roth said. “Before she hit the steps, she started the sales pitch. It’s certainly an honor to be asked.”
The mission of the tour drew Roth to participate.
“It’s a great mission, raising money for the Children’s Fresh Air Farm,” she said. “It’s the reason why I did it. It’s nice to help the mission by opening our home. The church does wonderful work.”
This is the Roths’ third home – and most likely their last, she said.
“They’re going to have to move us out of here to the old folks’ home,” Roth said.
Letterpress is a big part of Roth’s life, she said. Her studio features a floor press so large that the Roths had to consult with a structural engineer to make sure the press didn’t fall through the floor. Roth’s creativity will show up in the holiday decorations visitors will see upon entering the home – but it won’t be overdone, she said.
“Everything is real natural,” she said.
The tree will boast family ornaments with white and colored lights. Garlands and flowers will abound. Mostly, Roth said, it will look like home.
“It will be a reflection of us,” she said. “We are not trying to be something we’re not.”
One family tradition that will carry over to the tour is the annual gingerbread decorating contest that Kathleen, David and their children James and Eleanor participate in each year. Each family member will decorate a gingerbread house and put a house at each place setting in their breakfast room.
“I get competitive,” Roth said. “I posted each picture on Facebook last year and said ‘please vote.’”
And who emerged victorious?
“I want to say I won,” she said.
It is a home full of creativity – a home that feels like the Roths.
“It’s a feel-good, family home,” she said.