c £ £

BY PAIGE PO RTER

PHOTOS ALISE O’BRIEN

PRODUCED BY

MARY AN N E TH O M SO N

D r e a m W o r k s

WITH A TIGHT

BUDGETANDA

KEEN EYE FOR

REINVENTION,

ONE WOMAN

CREATEDA

HOME THAT’S

LIVED IN

AND LOVED.

Trenna Lange had an

innocent obsession:

cedar shingles

every page she’d ever pulled from a magazine featured similar cottages

with cedar shake exteriors. So when one popped up for sale in her St.

Louis neighborhood, she quickly made an offer and moved herself and

her kids just two blocks from their previous home.

While the exterior was the stuff of her tear sheets, the inside

offered Trenna the same challenge as any new home: How could she

best use the space and make it her own? She tackled the job the way

she takes on her assignments as a photo stylist, looking at her furnish-

ings and the house with a critical eye and rearranging until each space

felt lived in and loved. “I think it’s worth your time to spread the things

that you like around your house and then make a decision about what

works together and what doesn’t,” Trenna says. “Not all the things I

like necessarily work together, so I often need to edit.”