The holidays shine in this historic Thornbury home full of memories
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ome houses seem at their best when dressed up for the holidays. In this Thornbury house, built in the Victorian era, every room is touched with the enchantment of an old-fashioned Christmas. It seems so authentic that you expect Saint Nicholas himself to be sitting by the parlour fireplace smoking his pipe. For owner Andrea McDonald, preparing the three-storey house for the season is an all-consuming event that takes four full days. She starts in the restored attic, working her way from top to bottom adding sumptuous touches to every room until the whole house glimmers like a festive jewel box. It’s a big job and she loves every minute of it.
“It’s one of my great creative outlets,” enthuses Andrea, who has a degree in visual arts and design and runs a small design company, “Onsite Insights.” This passion for the holidays started when she was a child and her Danish father celebrated Christmas Eve with the magical customs of his native land. Then, when her two sons were little she wanted to “transform the house for the boys as quickly as possible.” Now the boys are in their twenties but she continues the tradition. “The family lets me do my thing,” she says with a laugh. “They would think there was something wrong with me if I didn’t!”
The house itself, one of Thornbury’s grand old mansions, provides a charming historic backdrop. It was built in 1907 just as Victorian architecture was transitioning to the dictates of Edwardian taste. Andrea and her husband Fraser bought it 13 years ago with the idea of using it as a weekend home. A year later they were so enchanted with the area that they left their suburban home in Aurora and moved into the house full time. Andrea recalls their first visit with the real estate agent. She was instantly intrigued by the old house, but when they mounted the stairs to the top floor and opened a creaky trap door to the attic, she was sold. The big black hole with open rafters didn’t deter her at all. It just confirmed that she loved everything about old houses – even spooky attics.
The couple spent the first 10 years tackling a significant restoration. They redid all the knob and tube wiring, updated plumbing and converted ’70s era bathrooms into ones more appropriate to the age of the house. A new furnace was put in and they raised and rebuilt the old carriage house at the back of the property, gutted the kitchen and converted that dark attic into a bright and airy third-floor master suite. The goal throughout was to be true to the period of the house. Andrea designed the kitchen herself after trips to the archives to research Edwardian kitchens.
Luckily there had only been a few previous owners and much of the vintage character had been kept intact – the original windows were in good shape, including some beautiful stained glass ones; the pocket doors still worked, and all the wood trim and moldings were in pristine condition. “I found out that only two children had lived in the house until we came with our 10- and 13-year-old sons,” says Andrea, “so I think we did more damage than all the years before.” It’s the untold stories of all those years that most interests her. “Old houses have souls,” she muses. “I sometimes stand and look out the living room window and think of the people who looked out the same window and worried about World War I. You just can’t replace that in a new house.”
Every season the house gets dressed up for the occasion. Andrea has a large storage room with industrial shelves filled with her collection of seasonal decorations. Throughout the year she checks out local second-hand stores and finds treasures that she stashes away, along with antiques that she inherited from her grandparents. Items are grouped according to season and the section containing Christmas décor is organized in colours. “My colour scheme changes slightly every year,” she explains, “and the foyer, just inside the front door, is always the focal point for the palette of the whole house. I like to keep a flow from room to room and I tend to use a lot of coppery, peachy colours. They seem to suit the vintage feel of the house and they also match the stained glass windows in the dining room.” Part of the fun is creating vignettes. In the cosy breakfast room overlooking the garden, for example, Andrea started with the image of snowflakes and ice on a crystal-clear winter day. She chose snowflake-shaped placemats and votive candle holders to brighten the table, and filled baskets and shelves with balls in iceberg colours ranging from very pale turquoise to deep jade.
The theme continues into the kitchen, where there is more crystal and turquoise in the niche above the plate racks. And because the tall, double-hung windows are so classic in their own right, she simply hung a white stocking in each one. In the upper hallway she keeps an antique steamer trunk that dates back to 1922 when the Cunard and White Star steamship lines merged. She stands it up open and uses it to create seasonal vignettes – like the old skates, a toy sled, and vintage binoculars that tell a story for the winter season. Keeping things natural is important because she loves the fragrance that fresh greenery brings to the house. The tree is a nine-foot-tall Fraser fir that is placed in the doorway between the living and dining rooms. For tree ornaments she chooses only those that have meaning and history. “I shudder at the fully decorated fake Christmas trees for sale in the stores,” she says, “I like the sentimental aspect of Christmas.” A sense of the past is the key to her holiday celebrations.
When Andrea was a child she was given a beautiful angel ornament, and every year she would wait until all the ornaments were on the tree before choosing a special place for her angel. She positioned it in front of a yellow light so the angel’s wings would shine. It’s not surprising that Andrea still has that angel, tattered wings and all, and every year it gets carefully hung on the family tree. Her Christmas angel is just one of dozens of stories that fill the McDonald house with memories and joy during the holiday season.
