A home away from home

BELLAIRE – David Schulz and Jim Walker love their home, and they want to share it with everyone – inside and out. This couple, who gave up their corporate jobs to follow their dream of owning and operating a bed and breakfast, have created an unusually beautiful, nine-guest room inn. They bought the Bellaire B&B in 1997 and thus began their never-ending process of improving, upgrading, redesigning and expanding, but their real love is the entertaining.
"I think both Jim and I tend to be nurturers," said Schulz. "When we'd stay at B&Bs, the ones we found to be the most enjoyable were the ones where the innkeeper was really attentive and cared about our stay. We always entertained a lot, and when friends of ours would see what we would do when we hosted them, they'd often say, "You know, you guys should really own a B&B.' It's an occupation that really caters to those of us who like to pamper people."
To stay at the Bellaire B&B is not only delightfully relaxing, it is also inspiring to would-be designers and landscape artists. Schulz and Walker are only too happy to share design tips and suggestions with their guests. In fact, they are planning to have seminar weekends that will include workshops on interior design and landscape artistry.
"This inn is my midlife crisis," chuckled Schulz, and what a fabulous crisis it is.
Schulz and Walker have been together for 22 years, ever since they first met at Purdue University in 1984. "Jim was finishing up his graduate degree in biochemistry and I was on the professional staff of Purdue University," said Schulz. A few years later, Walker got a job as a researcher at Michigan State. "That's when he had his midlife crisis and went back to school for his landscape design degree," said Schulz.
The grounds at Bellaire B&B are clearly the product of a knowledgeable gardener and are beautifully constructed and maintained. Each planting was selected to insure there is colorful bloom throughout the summer months. "Jim even designed the gardens so they would be attractive in the winter. At first I thought, 'this is northern Michigan. Who will notice the gardens in the winter?' But he soon convinced me that the 'bones' of the garden have a distinct shape that can effect how the house looks even in deep snow. It really does make a difference, and it is amazing that he was able to think through the design so completely."
The interior designs of the individual guest rooms are all different, with each room offering a completely unique style and feel.
"Each of the rooms is themed to a particular place or furniture style. Our goal is to make each room feel like it's a place that you would want in your own home – to get away from the real sterile, hotel-motel feel," said Schulz.
The main house is a stately Victorian mansion built in 1879. There are five guest rooms in that structure, behind which is a newly constructed carriage house that has four more guest rooms. The new structure was built to echo some of the lines of the old house, including high ceilings and high baseboards.
An 1800's carriage house contained the horses and buggies, so Schulz and Walker picked up on that transportation theme and designed each of the four rooms to evoke a different destination. There's the Savannah Room, the Tuscany Room, the Brighton Room and the Mackinaw Room.
"My favorite is the Brighton room, and its Jim's favorite too, but for different reasons," said Schulz. "Jim likes its whimsical look and that we could find such interesting things to go in it. It's my favorite because of the color tones – it's sheltering, comforting and nurturing feel. I feel like I don't have to know what's going on anywhere outside of those walls when I go into the Brighton Room."
Schutz said that new carriage house construction, completed last year, gave them more flexibility because they knew exactly what they wanted before they broke ground.
"The rooms already had their names. Like the Mackinac Room – we wanted it to look and feel like what it does up north," said Schulz. "Those design points became the foundation of the structures. For example, the Tuscany Room had to be earth toned, including the texture of the carpets, and we knew ahead of time that we wanted a particular size of the furniture pieces. It all had to reflect what it would be like for someone staying in Tuscany."
In the main house, each room has its own distinct period or feel, like the garden room which looks out over the backyard garden beds and a fountain, or the Eastlake Room which has a Victorian period, more formal feel to it. "In the Empire Room we went with a fusion motif that mixes the British style along with some artifacts and images from places that were part of the British Empire, especially their Asian colonies. Homespun is a very plain, Shaker style. And Vintage is sort of an eclectic, frilly room, very feminine – I wouldn't say 'a madam's room,'" said Schulz.
Their guests often ask the couple for help with home design projects, or sometimes they just want to copy one of the Bellaire B&B room designs into their own homes.
"Some of them we will be very up front. Like they'll ask what color is in a specific room, and we'll tell them the exact paint type and code," Schulz said. "For us that's a natural extension of being an innkeeper because there is a natural bond between the building and the innkeeper. It's like they're asking about our baby – who wouldn't want to talk about their own baby?"