Bailey-Vance House, Broad Street, Clinton, South Carolina
What are the top three signs that you have a great garden?
- Random passers-by ask to be married in it,
- Newspaper articles mention your orchids,
- The landscaping images are the most prominent photos in your real estate listing.
This is the 1892 Bailey-Vance House and gardens on 2.6 acres in Clinton, South Carolina.
With the gardens in mind, let's start our tour in the sunroom, then I'll take you around front and introduce you properly.
The sunroom was the house's original veranda, now enclosed and temperature-controlled to create greenhouse conditions. If it were mine, one of the first things I would do is fill it with flowers again, like this:
From there, let's step outside to the porte cochere and around to the front porch.
The house's interiors have been just as well-loved and cared for as its gardens.
I would add a little English inspiration inside, especially for these first two grand spaces:
The traditional blue and red color scheme flows beautifully into this sitting room:
It also continues in the dining room and breakfast room.
The butler's pantry and kitchen lean a little more heavily into the garden theme.
There's also a pretty garden-themed bedroom suite downstairs...
as well as a guest bathroom:
The upstairs mixes the red and blue with lots of florals. There are five bedrooms and five and a half bathrooms total, in 7,400 square feet.
The house was built for William and Florence Jacobs Bailey in 1892 and has stayed in their family ever since. William's father Mercer Silas Bailey started the town's cotton mills, naming one of them Lydia after his wife Rosanna Lydia. Meanwhile, the Jacobs family started the Thornwell Orphanage and School, on land adjacent to what would be their daughter's home.
{1912 map source}
The Bailey family was so integral to Clinton that in 1952 they held a pageant for the Lydia Cotton Mills' 50th Anniversary. In addition to crowning a "Lady Lydia," members of the Bailey family dressed up to portray their ancestors in a parade.
The house was later owned by the Bailey's nephew and his wife, Robert and Virginia Vance (Robert played his grandfather M.S. Bailey in the parade). They were also quite well-liked and active in their community. Under their tenure, the house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
They're also the ones who created panoramic vistas, grew the noteworthy orchids, and, every so often, hosted weddings in their garden.
