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Industrial DIY Farmhouse at Ohio

Julie Ranee is just one scrappy homeowner. Case in point: She and her husband, along with her father, did the general contracting for the entire residence. “None of us do this for a living,” says Ranee, a photographer. Lots of the subcontractors she utilized were friends of the family; even though her”crazy” ideas, they never stated that something could not be carried out. “Our friends and subcontractors just helped us make things happen. My mother watched the kids while we labored late into the night,” says Ranee.

The end result is a visionary, light-filled farmhouse with a reverse strategy that was built with all the willing hands and hearts of the Ranee family. Although the house has a rather different exterior and interior compared to all the other homes on the block, it is one that very much reflects the values extolled from the conservative Mennonites from the area.

in a Glance
Who lives here: Julie Ranee, her husband and their 3 children
Location: Plain City, Ohio
Size: 2,800 square feet
That is interesting: Ranee home-schools her children in the loft area of their house.

Julie Ranee Photography

“We work hard and exude family and faith,” says Ranee, who happily chatted about her house while making dinner in the kitchen and watching her children in the living room. The ability to manage more than one action at a time in any given part of the house is among the reasons she enjoys the open floor plan.

Julie Ranee Photography

Ranee’s front entrance, living room, dining area and kitchen are on the second floor; the children’s bedrooms and garage are located on the lower level. The dirt hill in this film is exactly what Ranee calls”a real gift from God,” as it had been hauled and awarded to them free from a nearby construction site that had to eliminate it. The hill allows cars to drive right to the front door. “It is wonderful how different the perspectives are going up just one story,” says Ranee, whose house is surrounded by expanses of corn and bean fields.

While building the house, neighbors and guests would remark that the house was quite different from anything that they had ever seen from Plain City. “I learned to take it as a compliment,” says Ranee.

Julie Ranee Photography

Julie Ranee Photography

This picture and the previous one reveal the kitchen, with its exposed joists and trusses, shelves, white oak hardwood floors and industrial light. There was no space to place can lighting (a common fixture in kitchens) since the kitchen ceiling shares the exact same surface as the loft floor over it, therefore Ranee’s subcontractors in Power Source Electric mounted the pendant light fixtures over the island by conducting electric conduit along the joists. “We love the outcome!” States Ranee.

Two outlets have been set up in the walk-in (the white door in this photograph ), which houses the microwave, toaster oven and other appliances, maintaining the kitchen counter clean and uncluttered.

Shelves: leftover wood from Ranee’s dad’s store; industrial stools and apron-front sink: Overstock

Julie Ranee Photography

This perspective of Ranee’s most important living area elicits a hybrid farmhouse-coastal interior layout style: oars extend the perpendicular distance and light neutrals from the decoration pieces throw a gentle nod to American coastal. Together with her mother, Ranee refinished many pieces of furniture that others within her community had cast off, a skill that she attributes to her parents’ very own scrappiness. “My daddy’s workshop is a place with which I’m very well acquainted,” says Ranee.

Julie Ranee Photography

She gathers many treasures in auctions, secondhand shops and garage sales — that this dresser included.

Julie Ranee Photography

This china cabinet keeping jadeite dishes is a heirloom piece from Ranee’s husband’s side of the familyroom. Drawing the eyes up is a canvas photo of a few of Ranee’s subjects from her photography business.

Julie Ranee Photography

“We had never laid a single tile and all of a sudden we had been laying our bathroom floor tiles. Ignorance is bliss whenever you decide to use black grout white tile, but I love how it turned out,” says Ranee of the half bath.

The best way to Select bathroom tile

Julie Ranee Photography

The stairs lead into a distance that had to be independent…

Julie Ranee Photography

… the loft, a dedicated area where the children are home-schooled. “I like that we’ve got the loft now to shop and organize our school supplies. It is nice to have the ability to’depart’ faculty upstairs while we go down and have a lunch break. When designing the house, we opted to use attic trusses, which enabled us to have a open loft in addition to readily accessible attic storage,” says Ranee.

Julie Ranee Photography

Ranee’s father produced the barn doors out of leftover flooring stuff. The center door opens right into a bathroom shared with the youngsters.

Read more about barn doors

Julie Ranee Photography

A clothesline showcases family pictures in black and white, another emblem of the family-centric values that Ranee and her community extol.

Julie Ranee Photography

Julie Ranee Photography

Ranee heard a terrific deal about herself and about beginning things from the very first grain of dirt throughout the building process. She looks back to their home-building process with great fondness, saying,”You will find lots of days when I’d have loved to have hired somebody to do the job, however in the long run, when I look round the house and see that people place so much hard, physical work into almost every single corner, it makes me smile. My motto throughout the entire build has ever been’We can do it!’ Truth be told, with God’s help we can do anything”

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