House Lust: A Freshly Flipped Ranch Near Garden City

A family home of two generations gets a facelift with Scandinavian influences.

When Mona Salzillo and her husband, Daniel, inherited his childhood home, the couple decided to “rob Peter to pay Paul,” Salzillo says, and give the Cranston house the full flip treatment before selling.

An elbow-grease endeavor this was not: The mid-century ranch required extensive electrical and plumbing upgrades as well as top-to-bottom interior renovation. The latter was helmed by Salzillo, a designer based in New York. Design plans were drawn up in November, the interior was gutted in January and the work was completed three weeks ago. Salzillo credits contractor Chris Di Ciccio’s “amazing time management skills” for getting the job done in time for the hot spring real estate market.

“In addition to renovating the kitchen and the existing hall bath, he also had to construct the master full bath from scratch,” she says. “We constructed that bathroom from three closets that abutted: a kitchen pantry, a weird closet in the dining room and the front hall closet.”

To keep costs under control, Salzillo mixed budget materials with high-end finishing touches. Case in point: Ikea cabinetry boxes and hardware in the kitchen with custom doors, panel and trim by the L.A.-based company, Semihandmade. Salzillo also frequented local shops — including the Color House in Cranston, Best Tile in Warwick and the Stone Depot of Rhode Island in Cranston — for fundamentals like paint, tile and countertop materials.

“In designing it, I combined modern American farmhouse and Scandinavian influences but really tried to make it a canvas that will work, whether someone’s style is traditional, modern or transitional,” says Salzillo of the three-bedroom home in the Dean Estates neighborhood near Garden City.

She also incorporated eco-friendly, VOC-free products into her design, including Forbo marmoleum in the mudroom, a hardy European flooring product manufactured from raw materials including linseed oil and cork.

Salzillo’s also offering the top bidder first right of refusal on most furniture and art, sourced from local spots including Benefit Street Antiques and Three Wheel Studio in Providence and trendy web-based outfits including Article. It’s a “have your cake and eat it, too” scenario, but with better lighting.

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