When it comes to her own house in St. Petersburg’s Historic Old Northeast, designer Kathleen Boss calls it a “fortress.” “It sits on a brick-lined street in, a charming, walkable neighborhood just north of downtown,” she tells us. “It’s a pocket of the city known for its mature tree canopy, layered history, and early 20th-century architecture that ranges from Craftsman to Mediterranean to Colonial Revival. There’s a soulfulness here, a lived-in warmth, that gives the neighborhood its heartbeat. You feel it in the scale of the homes, the craftsmanship, and the way neighbors gather on porches. It’s timeless, and it immediately drew me in when I first moved to the area.”
She purchased the 1938 home from the grandson of the original owner, and its restoration became a passion project for the Florida designer. “I felt a responsibility to honor the architectural integrity and legacy of the home while gently layering in modern refinements that supported livability and longevity,” she shares. “Original features like the tongue-and-groove wood paneling, parquet floors, and tiled bathrooms immediately stood out as non-negotiables to preserve. My goal was to restore the home with a fresh perspective, celebrating what made it special and elevating what could be reimagined.”
She spent the next 16 months working on the house. “It was almost twice as long as my typical renovation timelines, but it was such a unique moment in time,” she recalls. “The world was shifting in ways none of us expected, and in some ways, working on this house became an anchor. As it came together, I found myself falling more and more in love with it.”
The biggest challenge was striking the right balance between restoration and reinvention. Kathleen wasn’t necessarily interested in creating a period-perfect museum piece, nor did she want to strip away the soul of the home. “Every decision had to walk that line,” she notes. “What do we preserve, what do we thoughtfully update, and what do we push forward to elevate how the home lives today?”
The primary bathroom was tiny and had major functional issues, and the kitchen wasn’t original, so the designer gave herself permission to reimagine those spaces more fully. “With the rest of the home, it was about asking, ‘What’s best for the house?’ Much of the work wasn’t visible in the final photos—bringing the home up to current standards, modernizing systems, and addressing decades of wear in a way that still respected the original bones. It was about doing right by the home, honoring its past while quietly preparing it for the next 90 years.”
Throughout the house, especially in the great room and dining room, Kathleen layered in bespoke lighting, art, and meaningful objects—pieces that feel collected over time and help tell a soulful, lived-in story. She says this wasn’t just another renovation, but instead a legacy project. “I wanted to keep it in the family forever,” she shares. “At one point, I remember saying I wanted to put it in my daughters’ names—that’s how connected I felt to the story we were preserving and the soul we were carefully restoring.”
