Outdoor living spaces

Creating the Ideal Spaces for Your Love Story

Highlight Homes Atlanta Custom Homes, Luxury Renovations
Creating the Ideal Spaces for Your Love Story

They say that love makes a house a home. In celebration of Romance Awareness Month, Atlanta Custom Home Builder and Luxury Renovation Company – Highlight Homes wishes to reveal a number of ways that you can add an air of romance to your renovation or custom home construction. By incorporating one or more of these suggestions to your blueprints, you will be creating the ideal spaces in which your own special love story will unfold…

  • Master Bedroom: Well, this one is fairly obvious. The bedroom is the place where you will spend more than 2,500 hours a year – and only some of that will be spent sleeping. To create a sense of comfort blended with a slightly sultry suggestiveness, textures, colors and décor will play a major role. Design to fit your blended tastes and shared memories. For instance, if you share a particularly special memory of a vacation to the beach, you may want to incorporate nautically themed elements. This doesn’t necessarily mean you need to place a cheesy conch shell lamp on each bedside table. You can achieve the FEELING of a seaside sophistication through use of color, artwork and linens. If you’re looking for a more mainstream theme, colors like red, pink and white are often associated with romance and can appear as pops of color as an accent wall, in throw pillows, in an area rug, in your bed top linens – just to name a few. Satin, velvet and Egyptian cotton linens are also often associated with romance. The theory of Feng Shui suggests decorating in pairs to suggest harmony. Add a little mood lighting with a gorgeous chandelier hung directly over the bed or a handsome pair of pendant lights hung over your nightstands. You may want to incorporate a dimmer switch to soften the light. Lastly, floor-length curtains on each of the windows enhance the sense of romance.
  • Master Bathroom: The overall feel should be one of luxury. From a large claw-footed soaking tub to a super-sized walk-in shower, the suggestion here is that you make room for two. Flowers and candles will add a little romance to the air. This is another space where a dimmable switch may prove useful. Dual vanities are important for keeping the peace, as are his and her walk-in closets – so you may want to consider incorporating these in your custom master bathroom or bathroom remodel.
  • Kitchen: If you and your loved one LOVE to cook, your kitchen should be designed to support the two of you working side-by-side. Incorporating a large kitchen island that equally suited for food prep as it is for seating means that – for those couples who DON’T share a love of cooking – one can sit and chat while the other works their magic on the stove.
  • Family Room: The focal point of your family room should be the fireplace. Create a cozy setting around the mantle – no matter the weather outside – where you can enjoy cuddling with the one you love. Surround yourself with some of your favorite photos from different chapters of your love story together. Again, candles and floor length window treatments will serve to enhance the air of romance in this space.
  • Outdoor Living Spaces: What’s more romantic than a night spent in front of a crackling fire out under the stars. A firepit or built-in outdoor hearth can be your focal point, surrounding by cozy outdoor seating that’s ideal for cuddling. String lights above to add to the enchantment of this space. Imagine enjoying cocktails and sharing stories with the love of your life here for years to come.

The best news of all is that Highlight Homes can help you begin incorporating all of this and more in either a renovation of your existing home or the construction of a custom home. To learn more about Highlight Homes and our signature design-build method, please visit www.highlighthomesga.com. Once you’re ready to get started, contact us at 678-874-9234 or info@highlighthomesga.com. We’d love to have a hand in creating a beautiful backdrop for your happily ever after!

Five Must-Have Enhancements to Your Custom Home

Highlight Homes Atlanta Custom Homes
Five Must-Have Enhancements to Your Custom Home

Even though humans have been building homes for hundreds of years, we’re still constantly learning how to make them better – structurally, aesthetically, technologically and more. When building a custom home, it’s easy to consider all the special elements you’ve always dreamed of incorporating. But thanks to the ever-evolving world of architecture and construction, it’s also wise to consider integrating elements that time and experience have taught us are clever additions. While these additions can potentially number in the hundreds, Atlanta custom homebuilder and luxury renovation company – Highlight Homes – has narrowed down that list to our top five must-have enhancements to your custom home…

  1. Open Concept Floor Plan with Minimalist Design: Instead of breaking the interior of your home into well-defined rooms, one of the newest trends in home design is to create a seamless flow between main living spaces. This enhances the sense of spaciousness – making your home ideal for entertaining and encouraging a connection between family members who occupy those spaces. Your kitchen island may serve as the perfect vantage point to the dining room and family room – truly making your kitchen the living, breathing heart of the home. By adding a minimalist design to the equation, you also augment the feel of timelessness. When adhering to a specific design style – while it may be one of the hottest trends on the market – you could be dating your home over time. By going a safer route through minimalist design, you can still introduce furnishings and décor that suggest a hot design trend that can easily be altered over time to take advantage of the NEXT hot design trend.
  2. Smart Home Technology: From HVAC and lighting controls to a sound system designed to play the soundtrack to your life to a whole home security system, technology is playing a larger role in home design than ever before. Not only is technology designed to make your life easier, but the right combination of tools could also save you money in the long run, in power bills and innovative security measures. In addition to Smart Home Technology, you can also incorporate technologically smart elements like outlets tucked inside bathroom drawers to help eliminate clutter, as well as outdoor outlets and media connections to help make your exterior living spaces as fully functioning as your interior spaces.
  3. A Blend of Natural Elements and Artistic Flair: Bringing the outdoors in is a trend that has steadily gained steam in home design in recent years, from stacked stone fireplaces with heavy timber mantle to hardwood floors to stone countertops. You can also bring artisanal elements in to add a little bit of your family’s collective personality or design taste to the forefront through distinctive lighting choices, woodwork and more. Industrial-themed lighting or farmhouse-inspired shiplap walls can coexist harmoniously with natural elements and lend a little character to any room.
  4. Unification of Interior and Exterior Living Spaces: Just as the incorporation of natural elements in your interior design continues to grow in popularity, so does the unification of indoor and outdoor living spaces. One simple and beautiful way to accomplish this is through the addition of well-designed windows to extend the view outdoors and let loads of natural light indoors. Another way to achieve a fusion of indoor and outdoor living spaces is through placement and décor. Placement of an outdoor patio or covered porch or deck just off of a main living space encourages flow from the inside to the outside. And by having a clear design style/color theme throughout the interior and exterior of the home, you’ll be tying your living spaces together – rather than making them feel like separate parts of the same whole.
  5. Signature Spaces: Of course, one of the best things about building a custom home is the opportunity to make it your OWN. As a custom home builder, we encourage our clients to create signature spaces that are true to their family’s unique interests and wishes. For those who love movies, a dedicated home theater is likely a must. For families who love to entertain and celebrate the outdoors, a pool with tiki bar and outdoor kitchen may be the perfect addition that makes this home truly their own. There is no limit to the ways you can make a custom home truly YOURS. Make a wish list of the ways you would like to infuse parts of your family into your home, and a good custom home builder – like Highlight Homes – will find ways to make them happen.

Atlanta-based Highlight Homes welcomes the opportunity to help you realize the custom home of your dreams. To get started, simply call us at 678-873-9234, email us at info@highlighthomesga.com or fill out our convenient online contact form and someone will be in touch with you shortly!  To learn more about Highlight Homes and view our online gallery of work, please visit www.highlighthomesga.com.

Highlight Homes Makes a SPLASH in Brookhaven

Highlight Homes Luxury Renovations
Highlight Homes Makes a SPLASH in Brookhaven

Custom Builder and Renovator Unveils Latest Pool and Pool House Additions

At Highlight Homes, exceeding the desires of our clients is always our number one goal. In addition to the rewards that come from seeing the tears shine in their eyes and the broad smiles that light up their faces when their completed renovation or custom home is revealed, making them happy means that they’ll refer us to others and – sometimes – they’ll even call us back for a new project. That was the case for the Buie Family – who purchased one of our custom-designed renovated homes in Brookhaven just last year. They hoped to extend their gathering spaces outdoor and called upon the Highlight Homes’ team to completely reimagine their existing rear yard by creating a luxury retreat just outside their backdoor. The result was a stunning pool and pool house addition – just in time for summer!

Their new lounge pool comes complete with a lap lane and hot tub with stunning tile surround. The adjacent pool house offers a kitchenette with full size fridge/freezer combo for poolside refreshments, space for seating or dining, a flat-screened TV and full bathroom where bathers can shower off and change out of their wet swimsuits. The pool house – fashioned to reflect the same farmhouse-inspired design of the main house both inside and out – also features an extended covered front porch, perfect for the placement of several tables, cozy outdoor seating and/or a grill. Flooring and accent wall in the main space inside the pool house give the appearance of reclaimed wood, while the bathroom features a gorgeous blend of Moroccan mosaic tiles and shiny subway tiles in a show stopping black and white color story.

From a tropical poolside oasis with an intown address to an Italian villa-inspired outdoor kitchen and dining pavilion in the suburbs (and everything in between), the Highlight Homes design-build team welcomes the chance to help you up the WOW! factor on your outdoor living spaces. To schedule a no-obligation consultation and have a Highlight Homes representative assess your outdoor living space options, contact us at 678-874-9234 or info@highlighthomesga.com. To learn more about Highlight Homes, our signature design-build method and our award-winning custom home/renovation capabilities, please visit www.highlighthomesga.com.

We do interiors, too!  Take a peek inside both our Interiors AND our Exteriors Galleries!  And keep checking back as we continue to add exciting new projects!

Unifying the Interior and Exterior of Your Home

Highlight Homes Atlanta Custom Homes, Luxury Renovations
Unifying the Interior and Exterior of Your Home

“Nature is not a place to visit. It is Home.” ~ Gary Snyder

With Spring just around the corner, the promise of the return of green leaves to the trees and flowers to flower beds fuels the desire to get outside and play. No matter the time of year, there is a growing trend among homeowners and home buyers to infuse elements in their homes that create an undeniable connectivity between the great indoors and the Great Outdoors. Premier Atlanta builder and renovation company, Highlight Homes, is pleased to present a list of ways you can do just that in the design of your custom-built home or the renovation of your current home.

“Time to Spare” Room

Why merely add a new room to your home or integrate a flex space to the design of your custom home when you COULD create a space that’s all about relaxation, reflection and reverence of the space beyond the walls of your home. From a screened porch that allows for three-season enjoyment to a sunroom that provides a space to enjoy the outdoors all year round. This is a space where you can drink your morning coffee while watching the birds play in the birdbath or enjoy a nightcap while counting the stars.

Windows of Opportunity

Windows aren’t merely intended to let the light shine into your home or be opened to let the fresh air in. They can be reimagined as veritable works of art where the world beyond your windows serves as the palette. If you have a private backyard that serves as a particularly pleasing backdrop, you can open the frame a bit by creating a wall of windows – blurring the line between where the inside ends and the outside begins.

Feathering Your Nest

Another way to bring the outdoors in is to infuse elements of the natural world throughout your interior design. Use lots of interesting houseplants throughout at a variety of levels. Incorporate wood in your flooring, timber beams, accent walls and interesting furniture pieces. Include stone in your countertops and fireplace surround. Then enhance the sense of nature by adding wall art, throw pillows, rugs and décor that fit your color and design themes, but are inspired by the natural world. These might include birds, butterflies, dragonflies, horses, flowers, the ocean and so much more. Choose something personal to you as your central theme so it has real staying power and holds meaning.

Outside Looking In

Of course, the BEST way to extend your living spaces outdoors is to ADD an outdoor living space that could very well become your favorite “room” of the home. This might include a covered patio or deck with an outdoor hearth, pool with a cabana, outdoor kitchen with inviting seating, an old-fashioned playhouse with swing set, and so much more! Just imagine creating a space where you feel comfortable telling the kids to go outside and play, but “be home by dark” (‘cause they’re already home)! The memories you can make together in this space are virtually limitless, so whatever you create, make sure it’s the right fit for your family.

Highlight Homes welcomes the chance to help you incorporate one or all of these outdoor-focused enhancements in your new custom home or luxury renovation. To learn more about Highlight Homes and our signature design-build method, please visit www.highlighthomesga.com. Once you’re ready to get started, contact us at 678-874-9234 or info@highlighthomesga.com.

Building Beautiful Backdrops for a Bounty of Backyard Barbecues

Highlight Homes Luxury Renovations
Building Beautiful Backdrops for a Bounty of Backyard Barbecues

outdoor dining shutterstock_297166031The scene is set. A couple slabs of baby back ribs, a perfectly preheated grill, “Kiss The Cook” apron tied at the waist and a massive set of tongs in hand. But to truly set the scene, you’ll need a beautiful backdrop in which to create your mouth-watering masterpiece. Between the fact that May is National Barbecue Month and indications that the incorporation of outdoor living spaces continues to trend upward in luxury  home renovations, we thought we’d share a little inspiration to turn your own surrounding landscape into an awe-inspiring outdoor oasis. Here’s the Highlight Homes’ recipe for building a beautiful backdrop for your next backyard barbecue…

  • Finding the Right Ingredients:  Just as you might pore over cookbooks to find the perfect recipes to complete an unforgettable meal, it’s important to do your research to find the elements you believe will make your outdoor living space really stand out. Between Pinterest, Houzz and a treasure trove of online resources to interior design magazines and home improvement shows, inspiration abounds. Create a dream book of elements that really speak to you.
  • Make a Shopping List:  Now that you’ve created a book of elements that have you dreaming of countless shindigs under the stars, it’s time to make a list of all the ways you’d like your outdoor living space to function. Is it primarily a tranquil garden for quiet reflection at the end of a long day? Is it a big playroom on the exterior of your home where all the neighborhood kids can hang out? Is it a sports bar surrounded by loads of cozy seating with a flat screen TV for watching the big game? Is it a warm and welcoming space with an outdoor kitchen and long dining table where all the neighborhood grownups will want to hang out? Or is it a combination of two or more of those things? The possibilities are endless.
  • shish kebobs on the grill - shutterstock_249302788Hiring the Right “Chef”:  A really great landscape architect or general contractor can take the inspiration of the ingredients you’ve collected in your dream book, your shopping list of desired functions and the blank canvas of your backyard to develop a marriage of the three. Once you find the perfect balance of your vision, your budget and the realistic capabilities of the space, it’s time to make that vision a reality. Highlight Homes welcomes the opportunity to crank up the heat on your concept of a luxury outdoor living space. Contact us for a free consultation and proposal: 678-873-9234, info@highlighthomesga.com or fill out our online contact form and we’ll be in touch right away.
  • Season to Taste and ENJOY!: Furnish and accessorize your brand new outdoor living space to fit your own unique sense of style (we’ll be happy to help there, too!) and then invite your friends and family over to christen the space with a backyard barbecue of epic proportions!