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A Memorable Feast at Elway Hall

Rustic meets refined, and traditions are both remembered and made anew when Barry Dixon and Will Thomas host Thanksgiving dinner in the barn at Elway Hall, their home in Virginia.
Buffet table set for Thanksgiving dinner service with arrangements of ilex berries and roses

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Barry imagined a baroque feast in the early 20th-century barn and collaborated with floral designer Barbara Hamilton on arrangements of roses and ilex amid gourds and foraged vines that spill throughout the tableau.

As the calendar inches closer toward the end of November, Elway Hall, situated in the bucolic horse country of Warrenton, Virginia, settles into the familiar rhythms of the season. The ginkgo, maple, and oak trees that anchor its rolling hills burst into a blaze of fiery color against a clear blue sky. The goats, sheep, and chickens thicken their furry and feathery coats in preparation for much chillier temperatures just around the corner. And the cutting garden—abloom with peonies, roses, and dahlias in previous months—begins winding down for a long winter’s nap. Yet there’s still a bounty of natural materials to be found in rows of scarlet ilex, bittersweet that scales weathered fencing, and pumpkins and squashes ripened on the vine.

Split rail fence in front of the gambrel-roofed barn at Elway Hall

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Guests are always pampered with warm hospitality, delicious food, and a beautifully designed environment, whether at the main house or in the barn.

Inside Elway, homeowners Barry Dixon and Will Thomas prepare to host their Thanksgiving feast, with a guest list made up of family members, neighbors, and friends who have become like family. The early 20th-century Edwardian house, with its warren of generously proportioned living spaces and a second-floor hall lined with a succession of one sublimely decorated bedroom after another, seems tailor-made for country-house parties reminiscent of a BBC period drama. However, these gentlemen, who are indeed prolific entertainers, orchestrate every detail without a liveried footman or head butler in residence, and always with a graciousness and ease that belies the amount of thought and effort they put into making every guest feel at home.

Barry Dixon and Will Thomas in the barn at Elway Hall

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Barry Dixon and Will Thomas invite friends year-round to their home in Warrenton, Virginia, but they particularly love hosting during the holidays.

Thanksgiving table set for dinner with centerpieces of pumpkins, arrangement of holly berries and roses, tall candles

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

The table is set for dinner with a mix of family heirlooms, antiques collected during European travels, and new pieces found in local shops.

As a much-in-demand designer, Barry creates richly detailed interiors that take cues from his encyclopedic memory bank of design references, the multicultural influences he draws upon, and his artful eye and experienced hand for making houses as comfortable and welcoming as they are beautiful. Will, a former broadcast journalist and now a senior vice president or Sotheby’s International Real Estate, handles all the meal planning and preparation with a seasoned negotiator’s skill for knowing when to stick to the script and when to improvise—and one wonders if he may have missed his true calling for commanding the stove in a restaurant of his own. The duo’s respective talents, combined with their shared warmth of manner and innate gift for hospitality, make an invitation to Elway a coveted one when it’s for the most impromptu of reasons, but never more so than on a day like Thanksgiving.

Barry Dixon setting table for Thanksgiving dinner in the barn at Elway Hall

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Barry says, "I light a lot of candles and never set the table the same way twice. Some treasured pieces travel from table to table and year to year, but I never want a repeat performance."

“I light a lot of candles and never set the table the same way twice, whether we have a house full of guests or it’s just the two of us and Dinah [their beloved wire fox terrier],” says Barry. “Some treasured pieces travel from table to table and year to year, but I never want a repeat performance.” Will adds, “Barry usually stays out of the kitchen while I’m cooking, and I will have no idea what he’s doing with the flowers and the table, which makes for a fun surprise. He loves the drama of a big reveal.”

Plate of ham biscuits

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Ham biscuits are served on a transferware platter personalized with the house’s name, a treasured gift from a neighbor.

large chalk-board menu behind table with arrangement of roses and serving bowl of roasted acorn squash

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

For this Thanksgiving, guests are in for a truly unexpected reveal as they’ll be loading up in buggies and caravanning down the lane to have dinner in Elway’s restored dairy barn. Will, of course, is in the know for this part of the surprise, as he must factor in the timing and best method for keeping food warm and presentation-ready for its journey from the house’s scullery to the site. “I was inspired by the idea of the splendor of a baroque feast juxtaposed against the rusticity of the barn,” says Barry. With its aged copper roof, mangers on the ground level, and heart pine floors and vaulted chestnut timbers in the finished loft above, the barn “almost feels like a sanctum with a wonderful spiritual quality,” he continues. “It’s the closest thing we have to a chapel on the property and seems especially appropriate for a celebration about giving thanks for those we love and all we appreciate about life at Elway.”

Thanksgiving dessert table with flowers and huge grapevine centerpiece

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Desserts await on a nearby table, anchored with a massive grapevine from Napa Valley, a nod to Will’s California roots. Barry commissioned the tea service from a silversmith during a trip to Argentina.

Even though the hosts have chosen to serve the Thanksgiving repast away from a traditional dining space, what appears on the table hardly wavers from tradition. “I enjoy experimenting with new recipes, but this is definitely not the time for that,” Will says. While his own early recollections of holidays in Northern California revolve less around food and more around the camaraderie among his extended relatives, he is an ever-mindful caretaker of Barry’s culinary memories of Thanksgivings spent at his grandparents’ tables in Tennessee and Arkansas. Will reaches up to a shelf and pulls down a red-leather binder, a gift to Barry from his sister. It’s a compilation of many of the old Southern recipes passed down through generations of his family. “The pages get a new stain now and then from use, but I really do treat it like it’s a rare book,” says Will, as he flips to “Nettie Darr’s Dressing,” one of Barry’s favorites from his maternal grandmother. “As soon as those smells start wafting out of the kitchen, I’m transported right back to her house,” says Barry. “Although I never learned how to cook from my mother and grandmothers, I certainly did learn how to taste!”

Family Recipes: Get Will’s recipe for Basil-Blissed Mashed Potatoes, and Nettie Darr’s Cornbread Dressing recipe from Barry’s late grandmother.

Tall arrangement of roses, ilex branches, and greenery with mottled gourds and pumpkins

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Small arrangement of roses in red, orange, and umber on rustic table with pumpkins

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

The warm palette of reds, oranges, and umbers— colors that Barry gravitates toward in both his decorating and his product design—echoes the late-autumn landscape.

In the meantime, Barry and dear friend and floral designer Barbara Hamilton return to the barn to finish setting the stage for dinner. The warm palette of reds, oranges, and umbers— colors that Barry gravitates toward in both his decorating and his product design—echoes the late-autumn landscape framed by the barn’s hayloft doors. Barbara’s arrangements of roses, ilex branches, and greenery foraged from the property mingle with mottled gourds and pumpkins as textural as the pea gravel driveway that winds up to Elway. Baskets brim with homegrown persimmons, and gnarled wooden candelabras hold tapers that will light the room aglow when the sun starts to set. As Barry unpacks each carefully wrapped bin filled with the tableware he’s brought from the house, he also unpacks fond memories, recalling the provenance or story behind each antique platter or monogrammed silver fork. “Some are heirlooms I’ve inherited, and some Will and I have collected together from our travels,” he says. “Using these things reminds me of happy times and makes me feel like loved ones who are no longer with us are at the table.” As a final touch, Barry threads a wild tangle of vines across the groaning board and chalkboard menu and gives one last check to make sure each serving piece is in its proper place for the turkey and array of side dishes to be delivered a few minutes ahead of the rest of the party.

Henhouse at Elway Hall

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Barry designed the henhouse, which echoes architectural elements of the main house.

As guests arrive, they pause to say hello to Betty and Lou, the goats who serve as the barn’s unofficial greeters-in-chief, and then ascend the stairs for the big reveal. With champagne flutes in hand, they take in a setting that looks like it could be an Old Master still life painting come to real life in a Virginia barn. As everyone finds their seats at the table (Dinah’s is underneath with her own dog-friendly plate of roasted turkey and sweet potatoes), Barry and Will raise their glasses and make a toast to the good company, good food, and good times they gratefully share at Elway Hall.

Look back at our visit to Elway Hall at Christmas

FALL SCENES AROUND ELWAY HALL

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Vintage, pumpkin orange Chevy truck

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

A vintage Chevy truck sports an appropriate color for the season.

Pumpkins arranged around clay planter

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Homegrown pumpkins decorate almost every nook and cranny.

Goat standing on antique chair, another lying beside the chair

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

Goats Betty and Lou are two of the animals who make their home at Elway.

Bittersweet berries

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

The bittersweet vine that proliferates on the property is used in arrangements.

End of an antique stone bench

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

A stone bench purchased from Christopher Hodsoll in England offers a spot for reflection.

Black Copper Marans rooster

Photo by Erik Kvalsvik

This Black Copper Marans rooster dons the autumnal palette quite naturally.

By Karen Carroll | Photography by Erik Kvalsvik

See more from Barry Dixon on his website and Instagram.

Explore Barry’s fantastic library at the FLOWER Magazine Atlanta Showhouse.

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