NANCY HEMENWAY • The veteran of Design Research and Marimekko brings her
laid-back sense of style to her home and shop in southeastern New England
Nancy hemenway set out 20 years ago to build a house on 6 acres overlooking a tidal river in South Dartmouth, Massachusetts. Armed with a self-assured sense of design honed during a storied career in the retail home furnishings business, Hemenway
knew — and got — exactly what she wanted in her house.
Having Benjamin Thompson, renowned architect and
founder of the groundbreaking Design Research store in
Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Armi Ratia, founder and
owner of Marimekko, the Finnish textile company, as her
close friends and mentors helped, too.
A model of casual living, the place has the sensibility
of an old hunting lodge that has welcomed guests for years.
The open floor plan allows seamless movement from great
room to veranda to screened porch to lawn. To create sophisticated yet simple interiors, Hemenway mixed comfortable,
upholstered furniture with functional antiques. “Nothing is
too precious to use,” she says.
As a twentysomething in 1968, Hemenway was vice president in charge of merchandising at Design Research, and
she traveled extensively throughout Europe and Scandinavia
to stock the store with Marimekko textiles and clothing. In
1977, she opened Marimekko’s 5,000-square-foot store in
Manhattan, one of the first retail showrooms to mix modern furnishings with antiques. Today, Hemenway puts her
the focal point of the
great room is the
15–foot antique table
made in Missouri in
the late 1800s, which
Nancy Hemenway had
used in the Manhattan
Marimekko store to
fold dresses. A
screened porch at one
end of the veranda that
stretches across the
back of the house
(left) is a favorite
place to gather on
summer nights.
