Egypt and Mike’s Clients Went From a Tiny NYC Apartment to a Million-Dollar Atlanta Dream Home

When Whitney and Adam Petrone came to Atlanta looking for their first house, Egypt Sherrod and Mike Jackson knew where they were coming from — literally. They, too, had relocated from New York City. “They spent their entire relationship in a very small domicile, and we can relate to that, can’t we?” Egypt remarked to Mike. “That was one of our main reasons for moving south as well, from New York to Georgia: family, environment, work-life balance.”

Accordingly, Egypt knew just where and how the Petrones should put down roots. In the bustling suburb of Sandy Springs, she found them a 6,325-square-foot house with six bathrooms and five full baths. Built in 1994 with multiple spaces that were bigger than the whole apartment they’d occupied in New York City, Whitney and Adam’s new digs had work-from-home accommodations for both of them, as well as plenty of room for their 3-year-old daughter and all of the amenities on their family wish list. With an accepted offer of $1.05 million and a maximum budget of $1.3 million, they had all the resources they would need to let Egypt, Mike and the Married to Real Estate team work their magic. Feast your eyes on that dream home — chock-full of features that earned back the Petrones’ renovation investment before they even moved in — right here.

The Petrones’ new home initially boxed its diminutive kitchen and eat-in dining area behind both a wall and an ill-advised peninsula. That arrangement was a far cry from the gracious space Whitney dreamed of using for cooking, baking and entertaining, and it interrupted the first floor’s flow. Mike’s team demolished the extraneous wall and whisked away the island and peninsula, leaving a massive space that Egypt repopulated in a palette and theme she dubbed “tuxedo luxe.” “You just be making up names,” Mike teased.

“I do, but it sounds great, doesn’t it?” Egypt countered. “Modern elegance, but they’re very much into blacks, whites, slates and grays, so that tends to have a very formal feel, and it’s definitely chic!”

Egypt and Mike relocated the first-floor laundry room upstairs, a power move that gave the Petrones plenty of room behind the kitchen for what Egypt dubbed “a scullery-sized pantry.”

“A scullery,” she explained, “is essentially a prep kitchen. It’s storage, it’s where all the business happens, [it’s] your backup pantry. That way the main kitchen space is where you entertain; it stays beautiful [and] it stays clean — hopefully.” Close the tall black cabinet doors to the left of the refrigerator and that whole room disappears completely.

An avid cook and baker, Whitney now has more than enough space to indulge her every culinary whim without cluttering up her family’s serving and entertaining space. Sleek, slate-toned countertops create contrast between wraparound, white-oak-faced lower cabinetry and capacious matching uppers that rise all the way to the ceiling. Glass panels in the topmost cabinets add another layer of visual interest around the ceiling, and demilune stone floor tiles provide just a bit of warmth and texture.

Enamored with the elegant look of marble, Whitney was initially skeptical of Egypt’s insistence that porcelain was the material that best suited her needs for the island, countertops and range hood. At $200 per square foot, Egypt noted, marble would ring in at $32,500 for the whole project, whereas hardworking, handsome porcelain was $80 per square foot and would cost just $12,000 altogether. Furthermore, “natural stones are going to be porous, so you need to seal them,” she explained. “They are also not necessarily heat-resistant, so if we’re going to have the heat constantly blaring up, [then] I would not use [stone] on your hood, because this can yellow.” Whitney was eventually convinced and ultimately overjoyed with the kitchen’s finishes. “I mean, it looks incredible! It looks so good! I also love how thick it is,” she said.

In its original incarnation, the kitchen’s eat-in area encroached on prep space and felt woefully disconnected from the rest of the first floor. Egypt gave both spaces breathing room by extending the kitchen cabinetry — now handsome white oak uppers with black hardware perched above crisp black lower cabinets — all the way along the wall to the back of the house. She then relocated the dining table to the now-airy transitional space between the kitchen and family rooms at the rear of the house, adding an area rug and a pendant to add a bit of definition without interrupting the home’s fantastic new flow.

Egypt created a subtle contrast between the lower cabinets’ smooth faces and the new island by using tambour paneling — that is, thin slats of wood attached to flexible backing — to texturize its base. The once-honey-colored-and-rather-roughed-up hardwood flooring throughout the first and second floors, in turn, received a vigorous sanding and restaining with a lighter color that had a gray base. That TLC cost about $12,000, or a mere fraction of what the Petrones would have invested to pull up and replace their floors.

Mike’s team hauled out the bulky, 1990s-tastic entertainment center on the other side of the now-nonexistent wall between the eat-in kitchen and the living room and created a floor-through space at the rear of the house that basks in natural light from the verdant, walk-out backyard. A second contemporary pendant crowns the new spacious sitting area before the updated hearth, and a lower bank of even more oak cabinetry — affordable thanks to Mike and Egypt’s personal installation efforts — gives the Petrones the ability to whisk away clutter in no time. "So you’ve got a ton of storage to just throw toys in," Egypt told them.

The less-is-more fireplace surround Egypt chose to anchor the Petrones’ living room is a much-needed update that didn’t require a major rebuild, thanks to Egypt’s thoughtful redeployment of the black tambour she used at the base of the new kitchen island. Material like this can’t replace a fireplace surround, mind you — it’s wood and, therefore, flammable — but it can function as a minimalistic, contemporary frame that extends and formalizes a surround, much as a textural, contrasting mat would elevate a mounted and framed artwork.

The former butler's pantry beside the living room is now a wet bar that boasts an Egypt Sherrod original. Using $100 in supplies, she created a mirrored backsplash for the room with a dazzling, variegated patina antique lovers spend ages (and thousands of dollars) to acquire. "We wanted to really elevate [this] space because you can see it from the living room," she explained. "We were able to reface the cabinets on the bottom, but for the backsplash area, I needed something more reflective." Her DIY creation is now a stunning backdrop for the room's floating shelves.

Since Whitney and Adam liked the way the main suite separated its two vanity areas, Egypt kept reorientation to a minimum and focused on giving the installations a 21st-century facelift. White oak cabinets echo the cabinetry in the kitchen, pantry and living room downstairs, while round, chromed hardware and dark, veined countertops give this floor’s storage its own subtle character. Crisp, rounded mirrors and pairs of streamlined sconces reestablish a clean, contemporary look for the suite.

The once-compartmentalized shower is now a walk-in space accessible by the soaking tub. Extending the home's "tuxedo chic" with formal color blocking, Egypt selected dramatically veined stone for the lower portion of the chamber and long, narrow tiles in a vertical soldier stack for its upper half.