Living by another means
Published 12:00 am Monday, March 24, 2003
Bev Groh wasn't born in a barn, but she readily tells everyone she now lives in a barn. Groh lives in a 1930s barn that was rebuilt to be charming one-of-a-kind house. Groh has lived in her barn for the last year and a half and she loves it.
"I was looking for a place to buy, as I had sold my old house. I was living on campus at Riverland. I was the live-in manager of student housing. I saw that this place was listed and I wanted to see it. I kept trying to find it and I couldn't. My realtor said that I couldn't possibly want this barn house as it needed work and had no basement," Groh said.
Groh couldn't get the place out of her head and when she finally got to see the barn turned into a house, she fell for it immediately.
"I brought my two grown-up sons, Ryan and Aaron to see the house and they said 'no way, don't buy this place mom.' The house needed painting and had dead ladybugs all over. My boys thought I was nuts to even considering buying this place. I listened to what they had to say and then without consulting them further, I bought the place. I could see beyond the bugs and the fixing up," Groh said.
And fix up her barn house she did. Groh is the master of spray paint. She has vision and now scours garage sales, thrift stores and flea markets to turn other folk's castaways into treasures. She repainted the barn house, which was red, to a taupe with navy trim. She doesn't just put a coat of paint over walls inside the house, but adds details like stripes, swirls, rope and burlap to the walls and ceilings. Her favorite places to shop at are Fleet Farm and Menard's. Ideas come flying out of her mouth with rapid cessation of what she has done and what her next project will be.
"I'm not a perfectionist. I am a bargain hunter and if I find something I like, I will redecorate a whole room around a piece of furniture. If some project doesn't work out, I just start all over. It's my house and I can do what I want," says this strong, no-holds-barred woman.
Because of her vision and how she turned a building that others would consider a lemon into a dream house, her boys now wouldn't want their mother to live anywhere else. Recently she had a former owner come and see what she had done with the house.
"My boys were visiting and I told them to keep the house picked up as I had someone coming to look at it. They thought I was selling the place and were very upset. Now they can't see me living anywhere else," Groh said.
The barn originally belonged to the Gildner family of Austin. The Gildner's hired an architect back in the late '50s or early '60s to redo the barn; Groh is unsure of the date. Lee and Molly Nordin owned the barn house for several years and raised four boys in this one-of-a-kind home.
"None of the former residents treated the house like it was a barn. I painted my laundry room to look like a small barn. Now I have a barn within a barn. Two friends made signs for me that say Bev's Barn. I have one posted in my driveway. People are constantly giving me items with a barn theme," said Groh.
Groh's house is filled tastily with her barn paraphernalia. She has a wind chime with a tractor, books with pictures of barns, a barn cookie jar that moos when opened, small barn animals that line shelves and one wall with photos of the house as a barn. She has a photo album documenting how the house appeared when she moved in and the changes she has made.
Groh appears to have boundless energy. She uses her double-car attached garage as a dance studio. She teaches country line and couples' dancing. She also has rented out rooms to students at Riverland and one traded rent for doing some remodeling. Groh has worked 18 years at Riverland running the copy and mill center.
"This past summer I have been doing landscaping on my property. I love this place so much. I have wild turkeys come up and visit me three times a day. I get along with my neighbors and last fall I had a sleep-over with the neighbor kids from ages three to 13. We talked all night and ate Oreo cookies for breakfast. They are asking me when I will be having the next sleep over. One mother told me that her child said she wanted to grow up and be a kid just like Bev," laughed Groh.
Sheila Donnelly can be reached at 434-2233 or by e-mail at newsroom@austindailyherald.com