DIY All the Way | Inside Ellen Sharpe’s Rehabbed Massachusetts Cottage

One look at the trail of photo images, and I was hooked. You could practically hear the peace pattering down onto the dove-gray walls, the linen chairs, the just-dark-enough-without-being-oppressive hickory floors. Does quiet have actual colors?

Of course, there was all that light, too, pouring in through a panorama of French doors—that didn’t hurt, either. The doors faced a backyard that continued the handiwork of do-it-yourself dynamo Ellen Sharpe, who together with her husband, John, transformed a dilapidated 20th-century cottage into a little island of beauty in Stoneham, Massachusetts. The evidence was all here, captured on Instagram, preserved in our modern-day equivalent of amber.

I took a closer look. And another. Then I had to go see for myself.

Ellen greeted me at the door, long dark hair framing an animated face. Four-legged excitement came barreling right behind: Scotty and Sprite, two little Westies in disarray. Spreading out beyond them, an oasis of calm. But in fact this is a renovation spanning 24 years and counting. Ellen and John have done most of the work themselves, keeping costs down. “When I tell you we were on a budget—we were on a budget,” Ellen emphasized, her eyes lit with the challenge.

So that’s already fun enough (vicariously), right? Because who doesn’t love a good bootstrap renovation story? But this DIY tale doesn’t stop at the surface—it includes salvaged tables, sideboards that Ellen repainted, mirrors she refreshed, and chairs she stripped to expose the hidden artistry.

It’s DIY all the way.

And she chronicles her projects on Instagram for an avid audience of doers and dreamers. She demystifies the mysterious. You, too, can learn how to put a French finish on a mirror to make a bath tray. Or strip a dresser. Or do an authentic lime wash on wood. Or deconstruct a chair. Before long, you’ll find yourself staring down your kitchen cabinets, your lighting, your floors. Nothing will be safe.

Just don’t take a backhoe to knock off the rear end of your house—unless you really know what you’re doing, and plan to live surrounded by plastic sheeting for the next few years.

The catalyst for all of this? A worn-down little 1926 cottage hidden behind huge shrubs, about a quarter of a mile from where Ellen grew up, in the Nobility Hill Historic District of Stoneham, 11 miles north of Boston. As I sat down with Ellen and John at the marble-topped island in their bright, airy kitchen, I had a spectacular view of the lovely setting I’d scrutinized online for the past few months; I’d also seen a few of their daunting “before” pictures.

“My mother always used to talk about ‘this cute gingerbread house down the road,’” Ellen remembered. “John and I were just engaged and had started looking for a house. He happened to pass by and saw a dumpster outside. There wasn’t even a ‘For Sale’ sign yet.”

They bought the house in 1996 and—“with youth and inexperience on our side,” she says—began to fix it up. And fixed some more. Over time, they redid the kitchen. Twice. The second time, John took his backhoe and “knocked a big hole in the back of the house” to add on the present-day living/dining area, lined with French doors that open onto a stone terrace.

“For years I knew I wanted an addition,” Ellen said. “I come from a big family. My four brothers and sisters are all married with kids, and my parents are older, so I’ve taken over a lot of the holidays. We needed space for entertaining.”

Upstairs, they envisioned a master bedroom and bath, with a balcony overlooking the backyard. And a redo of their daughter’s room. Also, the stairs would have to be moved.

The challenge, of course, was cost. Two big advantages: Ellen’s imagination and John’s building expertise (he owns Pro Restoration, which does fire- and water-damage restoration and construction).

“It was absolute chaos in here,” she said. “It took two years, because we did it ourselves. We didn’t want to take out a loan on the house.” John added, “We had one Christmas with sheets of plastic, and one that was just raw space.”

“We sold our other kids,” Ellen deadpanned.

She found the French doors on Craigslist “even before we designed the addition—they came out of a house in Beverly.” They kept the old kitchen cabinets and added new ones; Ellen smoothed the differences with three coats of Benjamin Moore Snowfall White. Previous and new slabs of marble were melded for the counter tops. “It works,” she said. “A lot of people would say, ‘Well, you have to have all the counters the same.’ Expense-wise, we couldn’t. It’s barely discernible, but I love the two different looks.”

John built towering glass cabinets to house their collection of white plates, tureens, and glassware; Ellen tracked down Euro-style cremone bolts on Build.com for the pulls. They installed new hickory floors throughout the downstairs, including the front room, where John reversed the direction of the wood to differentiate the living areas.

Ellen still remembers the day when the plastic sheets were removed at last. “I was sitting on that couch over there, looking through,” she said dreamily, “and I finally could see it. And I thought, Wow, it’s going to look good.”

It’s a mix of “clean and classic,” she said. It leans toward French country, though she’s careful how much. There’s a hint of farm décor, too, but “I don’t want it too ‘chippy,’” she said. “I want it to stand the test of time.” Equally skillful? The blend of beautiful furniture rehabs. Tired chairs, tables, and sideboards, brought back to life. A handful of accents: antique garden urns with twists of rosemary, a massive dough bowl, a glass cloche.

Each setup is perfect. Every corner is a still life. “How often do you change it around?” I wondered. They laughed in unison. “I’ll leave at 7 in the morning, and when I come home at 8 p.m., it’s all changed,” John said.

Ellen nodded, grinned, no guilt. “Every day.”

For more of Ellen Sharpe’s design inspiration, check out@featherglass on Instagram.