Beams Fit For A Dream Home Boone Company Harmony Exchange Featured on HGTV’s Dream Home By Jeff Eason Every American aspires to own his or her dream home. For the past decade one television show has been making that dream a reality. And this year, they are doing so with the help of a unique company located right here in the High Country. A computerized depiction of the Dream House to be built at Lake Lure. Image courtesy HGTV. HGTV Dream Home host and house planner Jack Thomasson and his crew were in Boone last week filming a segment at Harmony Exchange. Photo by Jeff Eason. Home and Garden Television—better known as HGTV—has become one of the most popular channels on cable and satellite TV through its formula of featuring shows that instruct people how to improve their surroundings. They have also attracted plenty of viewers with their annual Dream Home giveaway show. Last year over 39 million viewers registered to win the once-in-a-lifetime giveaway. For Dream Home 2006, HGTV has opted to build a stunning estate in the Blue Ridge Mountains in the luxury resort community of Grey Rock at Lake Lure, North Carolina. The new project is particularly special for the show because it is the centerpiece of the 10th Anniversary of Dream Home. Last Friday, an HGTV film crew and Dream Home host and house planner Jack Thomasson were in Boone to film a segment at Harmony Exchange on Roby Greene Road. The local company is building beams and other amenities for the new house at Lake Lure. “This has become the largest promotional giveaway on television,” explained Thomasson. “For the tenth anniversary I scouted the entire country to find the perfect location. Last year’s event in Tyler, Texas was our biggest ever and we expect this one to surpass it.” The choosing of the Blue Ridge location for the 10th Anniversary Dream Home proved to be a golden opportunity for Harmony Exchange. The company had worked previously with the architects and was chosen to provide timber framing for the new house. The interior timber beams will be a focal point of the interior of the open living room space in the house and will give the building a distinctive mountain cabin feel. The timbers are made from antique heart pine that was reclaimed from an old textile mill in South Carolina from trees that were originally harvested in the late 1800s. Such giant pieces of antique heart pine are associated with old growth forest and are extremely rare these days. “One of the advantages of using reclaimed wood is that it is completely dry,” said Theresa DeMarco, senior project manager and director of planning for Harmony Exchange. “The wood will not experience any warping or cracking.” The wood also has a lot of character going for it. It has the hallmarks of its previous life in the textile mill such as nail holes and the stains of age. Reclaiming old growth timber is just one of the many creative construction projects undertaken by Harmony Exchange. The company also offers log and timber frame packages for homes, a wide variety of building materials, and custom design projects for houses and businesses. Harmony Exchange first opened its doors in Boone in 1996 and now employs 33 people in the High Country. All of them are excited to be working on the Dream House project. “This is our first mountain house,” said HGTV host Thomasson. “We’ve wanted to put a house in this region for a while. We’re excited to be working with the craftspeople at Harmony Exchange. They offer a unique element to the HGTV Dream Home.” Harmony Exchange had previously worked with architects Al and Parker Platt on several projects including a recent house in Asheville. When HGTV selected the Platts for its 10th Anniversary Dream Home, they immediately thought of Harmony Exchange to provide wood and craftsmanship for a unique mountain touch. “The goal for the home design, as with most of our house designs for mountain settings, is connection,” said Al Platt. “Connection of the house to its place, connection of the people who use the house to its place and connection of the people to each other. “In this case, the house is organized to follow the high mountain ridge where it is located. From the top of a ridge you can look both ways. And the house is completely open at the center, so that by the view through the house, the visitor is dramatically located along the top of the ridge, able to see both ways from within and without the structure.” So far the 10th Anniversary Dream Home project has pleased everyone involved, including HGTV president Burton Jablin. “HGTV again searched the U.S. for another dream-worthy location,” said Jablin. “We believe we’ve found it in the mountains of western North Carolina. The home we’re building at Lake Lure includes many of the attributes that research has shown us people are looking for in a Dream Home.”