Stuart Vevers told me the house has six rooms and a balcony and that it dates to 1937. I was surprised and said, “Wow!” “Isn’t that the same year the movie Snow White came out?” This conversation isn’t as awkward as you might think: Vevers is a Brit who has been the creative director at Coach for a long time. He’s been an avid Disney fan for more than a decade, and I humbly admit that I’m a Disney buff myself.
Weaver and I had discussed this before, so I already knew she was a connoisseur of Disney experiences around the world, including her home in Orlando, which she had visited more than 10 times — and I soon learned she was closely connected to him. One of her early dates was a wedding to her husband, assistant design director Ben Seidler, held at Disneyland Paris. Now she and Seidler have escaped to this cabin-like space with their twins, River and Vivian, who are just four years old and veterans of the Magic Kingdom’s Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, where Vivian received the ultimate transformation and dazzlingly became a princess. Both eyed the visitor a little warily — had my displeasure at the old-fashioned wallpaper distracted them? Any semblance of editorial objectivity vanishes as soon as I walk into his 1,100-square-foot home, where the walls are covered with 1930s scrap paper last used to decorate the living room by an Astaire Rogers movie.
If ever there was an ideal place to live and stay, it was this hideaway the weavers and designers discovered online two years ago. Their property search turned up three grainy photos, along with text that read “hidden gem, hidden.” Yes, it’s hidden, yes it’s hidden — but it’s not in the best condition.
It was owned by the same family from 1937 until 10 years ago. Unfortunately, the place had been uninhabited for nearly a decade, there was no electricity, and there was a dead rat lying in the hallway. “I’m scared of rats,” Wevers told me. But Stuart, I said, aren’t there lots of animals here? We’re in the countryside! “Only chipmunks and rabbits – so far, only cute things!” he insists – though after gentle questioning, he admits he’s seen a bear and her cub – cute? – on the street before.
Anyway, when he crossed that little bridge and saw this place, he went absolutely crazy. “Most people didn’t want it – it was too small and in need of renovation – but I was fascinated. We kept the footprint of the room as much as possible – it was like a renovation – and we didn’t bother with the architecture. Instead, it was done with a local builder: I think doing the work by hand is more appealing: the windows, although totally new, still have the same wooden frames they had 80 years ago; the false ceiling has been removed; now, there are sloping ceilings upstairs; there are two cases of slightly weird retro antler chandeliers.
When you have a little over 1,000 acres in total (details: 40 acres), it won’t take you long to tour the house. That being said, the magic is in the details, like the Jenny Lind spindle bed in the river and Vivienne’s shared room that comes with the house. “I want our house to be fun, entertaining and happy for them,” Weaver said. I asked her if the twins live together, and she said that although they can be friends and enemies, sometimes she finds them telling each other stories in bed.
The rest of the home’s furniture was found in antique stores or flea markets — the Elephant Trunk Flea Market, which the couple frequented, is just a short walk away. The floral painting in the master bedroom was found on Shelter Island; the hooked rug in the hall, bearing the date 1937, was found in Massachusetts. A pair of 19th-century pink Bristol glass lamps in the living room were feared to be broken by the hands of a four-year-old, but the Weavers didn’t mind — to them, the twins were growing up in beautiful surroundings that were a delight to them. “Children are attracted to places where they are well cared for,” Seidler said. She added that any inevitable little tragedy becomes a story in the family’s life.
In the winter, when the river freezes over—and Weaver admits, the bridge can be a little slippery—the kitchen has a wood-burning stove for comfort (though this isn’t 1937; the house also comes with central heating), and the restored cabinets have scalloped valances. “I love old things,” Weaver explains, “but there’s also an environmental question—why not use something that already exists? All the kitchen floors are reclaimed wood—they looked the same originally. Exactly like they do now, but they’re also old.
The Weavers nodded when I pointed out that the 1930s-style bathroom, though cute, might be fine for two adults and a few preschoolers, but could be challenging when those cute kids turn into older teens. It would provide a place to stay for friends and relatives and, inevitably, a haven for depressed teens to play music as loud as possible.
“River, don’t take the toy out – you only played with that for 30 seconds!” Seidler playfully scolds her son, who must have returned to the hand-painted wedding box in the dining room one too many times. The tables are decorated with Ginori’s Italian fruit-patterned decorations, which the couple has collected over the years, numbering hundreds of pieces, while glasses and cutlery come from the nearby store Plain Goods. “We use everything – nothing is for show,” says Vevers.
Everything here is so thoughtful and lovely that I asked Weaver about the house where he grew up in northern England. Are those great places too? he said, smiling. “We lived in a semi-detached house with lovely suburban decor – at one point we lived near a pub! I had a typical 80s teenage bedroom: I had a picture of a band called Five Star whose poster I loved.” Weaver, who attends the University of Westminster, lives with three classmates in a student flat in Harrow, where the rent is £30 a week and it’s so cold he remembers wearing gloves to bed, “I could see my breath.”
It’s a thing of the past. Now, aside from the shelter, the family’s primary residence is a townhouse on Manhattan’s Upper West Side — not far from the 77th Street weekend flea market. “We’ve got something nice there!” There’s also a circa 1908 Arts and Crafts house in the English Lake District, where the couple celebrated their wedding in 2014. This time, however, it was the Toontown-sized resort that won over the revelers. Right before I left she offered to light up the bridge and I wanted the lanterns to illuminate Mickey, Minnie, Donald and her nephew on the bridge. Instead, River and Vivienne were barefoot, jumping up and down, begging their parents to allow them to play in the water.
In this story: Cosmetology, Kumi Craig; Rebecca O’Donnell; Interior Designer, James Covello.
