Fearrington House is ringing in the New Year with a number of projects designed to improve the guest experience.  Here’s a sneak peak at our first completion: a handsome new upstairs reception space at the Restaurant.

If you’ve dined upstairs, it’s probably been in RB’s Office, a large room seating up to 20 people with windows on three sides. To get there, you’ve passed through a cozy upstairs landing area and may have seen another dining room to your left. While RB’s Office gets positive reviews, the small size and low ceiling height of the other rooms in this former farm house, made them a bit unappealing. More...

Last week new artwork showed up on the walls at the Granary, and it’s definitely worth a look. Local artist Delia Ware Keefe has installed a collection called “Fossilized Layers,” a soothing, calming assemblage of  hand-pulled prints inspired by shapes and forms found in nature.

Says Delia, “I begin making my art by studying the shapes, textures, and forms of organic objects which I have collected over many years. Land and sea, trees, water, birds’ eggs, nests, shells, sticks, leaves, blossoms, webs, stones, insects, fossils, and bones inspire me to draw, paint, and print. Through studying their unique forms I develop designs and abstractions.” The results are beautifully layered imagery, mixing the boundaries between the real and abstract. 

Delia earned her BA in studio art and art history at Emmanuel College, Boston, MA, and studied graduate printmaking at Ohio University, Athens, Ohio and here at UNC.

Look for Delia’s prints in the mezzanine level in the Granary (down a half flight of steps). Come take a peak next time you’re here for lunch or dinner.

Fearrington is full of residents who volunteer their time for worthy causes inside and outside its boundaries. One of the most visible, and demanding, such jobs is President of the Fearrington Homeowners Association. The FHA is tasked with enforcing bylaws and rules, managing common property and in general protecting property values and public safety.

Fearrington is a planned unit development – one of the first in North Carolina – of nearly 1,200 homes. Some homes are single family while others are townhouses. Some neighborhoods have maintenance plans managed by sub-associations, while others have no maintenance plans. That diversity is an asset in that residents can stay at Fearrington, and keep their friendships, clubs, membership at the Duke Center for Living, etc., as their needs change. The FHA orchestrates all these moving parts.

Recently David Erisman assumed role as FHA's President.  Originally a native of Delaware, David is a die-hard Carolina fan (he received both his undergraduate and law degrees from UNC). Learn more about David, and the role of the FHA, here.  Congratulations to David on his new assignment!

Sometimes as garden plants die back for the season, bare or unattractive garden hardscape features emerge, like unwelcome guests. It could be a bare trellis where vines once grew, a fountain devoid of water, or exposed planters or hanging baskets.

However with a little effort and locally sourced cuttings, there are ways gardeners can cover up these features and add some winter cheer. And it costs nothing! Here's what we've done recently in Jenny's Garden, behind the Inn Building.

For the holiday season this year, we decided to experiment by decking out some of the feet tall irrigation towers with Fraser Fir branches that were pruned from some of our Christmas trees.  They were then topped them with holly twigs pruned from some of the exuberantly berried trees and shrubs around the gardens. To hold the greenery in place, long whips were pruned from an Eleagnus and were wound around the fir greens, using the sometimes bothersome hooked spines spaced along the Eleagnus twigs to fasten them to themselves. More...

“The Autumn counterfeited Spring, With such a flush of flowers,
His fiery-tinctured garlands more, Than mocked the April bowers,
And airs as sweet as airs of June, Brought on the twilight hours.”
- D. Mulock Craik

As we enjoy our last days of Fall and enter into our winter months, I realize how lucky we are to live in a part of North Carolina where all of the seasons come to us so gloriously loud and distinct.  I don’t know what the weather contributed to our Autumn of 2011, but it was a spectacular one in Fearrington!  The color of the leaves were more piercing against skies, the color of which no name has yet been found, and gave even the bare branches a golden shine. 

The Black Walnut, White Oak and Red Maple giants reigned, holding upwards, as long as they could: crimson, saffron and bergamot, before dropping their brilliant leaves down to us…so we could walk the many paths, gather and press into a book - one such leaf too fiery to pass up - and to remember a walk in a beautiful place…and to always enjoy, living in Fearrington!

 - Julie and Nathalie

Frequent diners at The Fearrington House Restaurant know the affable and attentive Dutch-born maitre d’, Joris Haarhuis. Joris just celebrated his 20th anniversary at Fearrington House – a pretty amazing feat, and just about a miracle in the hospitality world! I sat down with Joris to learn more about his time here and here’s what he said.

“I went to the hotel school in The Hague. To complete your degree, you need to do an overseas internship. At the time, my brother Bart was the food and beverage director at The Siena Hotel [in Chapel Hill] and he introduced me to Fearrington.  I came here originally for only six months, and I did everything – cooked breakfast, carried bags, bused at the Restaurant, did turndown service – wherever I was needed. I stayed for a year and a half because I liked it so much. Then I went back home and graduated. A few months later [proprietor] R.B. [Fitch] called and asked if I wanted to come back. I said yes.”

After a few years at the Inn, Joris moved to the Restaurant, in his present capacity as maitre d’. Within a year, the Restaurant received its first ever AAA Five Diamond award, an honor it's held now for 17 consecutive years. We believe it's no coincidence! More...