The Story
Designer Rachel Horn never had plans to buy a home in Louisville, Kentucky: She’s based in Austin, Texas, and only visited from time to time to see her best friend, Adrianne Hoadley. But Adrianne is a real estate agent who has lived in the area for 20 years, and when she saw this 1937 Bauhaus-style kit home, she could just picture Rachel living in it. “From the photos it looked so warm and inviting, like a little jewel,” says Rachel.
She hopped on a plane the next day and discovered that the place was even better in person. “When I saw this cute, modern box of a house in a neighborhood of traditional brick homes, I fell in love,” she says. Rachel kept some of the charming details, then transformed the rest of the 1,070-square-foot space with a bold black-and-white palette — starting with the exterior. To freshen up the metal-paneled house, built from a prefab kit, Rachel painted it Caviar by Sherwin-Williams. “All of the surrounding greenery made me think the black would pop,” she says.