Meet A 200-Year-Old Luxury Boutique Inn with History and Heart on Lake Winnipesaukee

Photo credit: Meaghan Murray
Photo credit: Meaghan Murray

After years of summering in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire, nicknamed "America's Oldest Summer Resort," Patty Cooke and her husband, Peter, knew they were ready to move to the charming town on Lake Winnipesaukee full-time. Patty, a Boston-based interior designer, already had many clients with properties in Wolfeboro, and she was content to spend the rest of her career doing historic renovations and new builds for those seeking a lakefront refuge. However, life had different plans for the Cookes, and today, Patty is not only a residential designer, but she and her husband own Pickering House Inn, a gorgeous, early 19th-century home on Main Street that they have transformed into a beautiful, soothing retreat for the modern age.

Us Vs. A Dollar Store

The then-dilapidated building on South Main Street fell into the Cooke's laps after one of the engineers helping Patty on a residential project told her that a dollar store chain was planning to purchase the property from Bank of New York Mellon. The designer says that the town had talked about the property for years saying what a shame it was that it had become so run down, especially because it's so rare for anywhere to have a barn downtown that dates back to 1813 these days. That night, Cooke and her husband went out for a drink with the drive to save this place one way or another.

"I told Peter that this is a classic thing of how things happen in a town to where later, people ask, 'why didn't we know?'" says Cooke. "This property is such a focal point to the town, and once it goes, the ship has passed and there will be no coming back. I told him that I can't live having to look at a dollar store everyday and that I wanted to put an offer on it."

Photo credit: Courtesy of Pickering House Inn
Photo credit: Courtesy of Pickering House Inn

The property was on the market for next to nothing since the building would have to be knocked down (or so they thought), but it was commercially zoned on city water and sewer, and in a fantastic location, so the Cookes saw value in it. The couple put in an offer and the bank took it that same day. Soon after, the dollar store corporation that also wanted the property reached out to them and offered to pay double. The Cookes stood their ground.

"After they offered to buy it from us, I got to see their plans, and it was absolutely horrifying," says Cooke. "The property always looked like an inn, and it felt like Wolfeboro was ready to have a more stylized, higher end property for people to stay, and this place needed to be it."

Becoming Hoteliers

While Patty and Peter Cooke share a special skillset that made them right for the job—not only is Patty a designer, but Peter is president of a commercial real estate project management company—their hospitality knowledge didn't spread much farther than hosting their extended family for the holidays. However, the couple shares a passion for travel, and due to their line of work, they have a heightened sense of how a property they're visiting feels and functions. A weekend at "inn school," as Cooke calls it, helped them think big-picture about their property (it needed to have at least 10 rooms if they wanted to keep their full-time jobs and support day to day staff), but the couple now wanted to think smaller—and even bigger.

Photo credit: John Greim - Getty Images
Photo credit: John Greim - Getty Images

One of the Cooke's favorite weekend destinations is Woodstock, Vermont, and they loved the story behind the town. Business mogul Lawrence Rockefeller married a local resident, Mary Billings, and the pair spent many years repairing and restoring the town's historic buildings and worked with the community to help the build thriving local businesses downtown, helping it become the charming, thriving destination it is today.

The Cookes knew if they were going to build an inn, they wanted it be so much more than a building, and spent many weekends chatting with the then-general manager of Woodstock Inn, as well as the Pitcher Inn in nearby Warren, and with designer Annie Selke, a friend who also happened to be working on her namesake inn in The Berkshires to talk through the smallest of details and the grandest of visions for their lakefront resort town. No detail would be a product of taking the easy way out, and they dreamed of a place that attracted sharp talent who love Wolfeboro as much as they do. The Cookes knew that if they could just put their money where their mouth was, the town would step up.

Excavation and Renovation

Patty is certain it would have been cheaper and easier to have knocked down the existing house to build their inn, but she didn't consider it for a moment. While she often works on new-construction projects, her heart is with historic restorations.

"I think if something has made it this far, it deserves to have a next chapter," says Cooke. "The world is losing its character." However, she will be the first to recognize that the world is a vastly different place than it was in 1813. After many discussions with hotel managers and friends, the couple knew they wanted to make the inn's rooms as spacious as possible—and the bathrooms as luxurious—but the home's current layout wasn't cutting it.

Photo credit: Courtesy of Pickering House Inn
Photo credit: Courtesy of Pickering House Inn

Re-designing the inn then became a jigsaw puzzle, as the house has 93 windows, and Patty was intent on keeping them all. They also wanted each room to have its own thermostat and each bathroom to have heated floors and electric showers, which would be a wiring nightmare. To top it all off, the couple employed architectural historians to research the property, and they eventually designated it on the National Register of Historic Places, as it belonged to Wolfeboro's most prominent resident, Daniel Pickering, a businessman, hotelier, and photographer whose works can be found at the NYPL. This meant the bar for restoration was set even higher than the Cookes had already set it themselves.

The couple saved as much of the house as they could, they even saved a maple tree that needed to be taken down and had it milled into various furniture pieces throughout the inn, and the whole crew enjoyed "excavating" the original home. Works of art, bottles, books, and letters were among many items found in the walls and all are used throughout Pickering House Inn in some form or fashion. All of the original posts and beams were saved too, though it would have been easier to cover them up, and they saved as much of the woodwork as they could. What couldn't be saved was replicated as closely as possible. The couple was even set on keeping the original color of the home, a warm, buttery yellow.

A Project That Reaches Beyond Wolfeboro, New Hampshire

Like any small town, rumors spread, and soon after the couple purchased the 1813 property, they celebrated with a glass of wine at a local restaurant where they overheard the table behind them chatting about "the people from New Jersey "who bought the big yellow building and were going to turn it in into condos and offices.

"First of all, we are from Massachusetts, and I told my husband, if you think I'm going to listen to rumors for two years about this place, I won't," says Cooke. "I called a former colleague from my marketing days and told her I needed a platform where we can keep people up to date with accurate information." Shortly after, a blog was created with the intent to keep locals in the know, but its reach began to expand.

Photo credit: MORGAN KARANASIOS
Photo credit: MORGAN KARANASIOS

"I started getting all these emails within a few weeks after starting the site and was so confused because I'd only told a few people about it at the time," says Cooke. "We checked Google Analytics one day and saw the site was getting 1,800 views, and the next day it was up to 3,000." Within months, the Cookes received nearly 250 emails from people around the country thanking them for saving the old yellow building on Main Street.

Throughout the project, the couple updated the blog and used it as a way to crowdsource ideas on which shampoo and wine glasses to use, among others, and they turned into a book, which is about to undergo a reprint. And it all started with creating a website on a dreary winter day when Cooke was second-guessing it all.

While the blog connected the couple with people as far as California, one of the most exciting connections was made with a woman living in their former home town of Boston. The Boston Globe wrote about the inn and restoration while it was still in progress, and the woman emailed the couple saying she recognized their building. Her late husband turned out to be a descendant of Daniel Pickering, and she possessed a photo album with early photos of the building full of loved ones, which only increased the couple's drive to keep the project going.

Photo credit: Courtesy of Patty Cooke
Photo credit: Courtesy of Patty Cooke
Photo credit: Courtesy of Patty Cooke
Photo credit: Courtesy of Patty Cooke

"It Looks Just the Way We Pictured"

The Cookes hit their goal of opening the doors to Pickering House Inn within two years, and in 2018, they held an open house for the town to see the finished work. Patty says they'd been floored by Wolfeboro's response to their passion project, from the little old ladies at the post office encouraging her that the inn is looking great and to hang in there to the Kindergarteners at the elementary school next door, who'd been trained by the gym teacher to shout, "looking good!" with a thumb's up when they passed by the inn. Nearly 1,500 people showed up at the open house in the pouring rain that night to thank the Cookes for doing the work that everyone wanted to have done but never did.

One blistery winter's night, the acclaimed Boston news anchor Anthony Everett had returned to the inn after reporting on it months earlier with his girlfriend for a long weekend, so Peter and Patty went to check on them and the other guests retreating from the wet New Hampshire weather before turning in for the night.

"We came inside to see two couples that had just met at the bar enjoying glasses of wine together and then went into the library where a couple was knitting and reading, and in the living room, Anthony, his girlfriend, and two other couples were cozied up by the fire chatting," says Cooke. "I remember us walking back outside in the sleet and looking back at the inn with all the candles lit saying to each other that it looks just the way we pictured."

The Pickering House Inn Experience

Upon arriving at Pickering House Inn, you realize this is a special place. While the town is now notorious for being a celebrity haven—Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore both own homes here—it holds onto its New England charm, and the inn does the same. The property has since expanded to a highly acclaimed fine-dining restaurant and brand-new boutique spa facilities next door (that same dollar store chain threatened to buy the adjacent lot after not getting the property, so the Cookes had to buy that too), and the full Pickering House Inn experience is now complete as of this summer. And every square inch of the Cooke's handiwork shines.

Photo credit: Winter Caplanson
Photo credit: Winter Caplanson

I arrived at the inn for Fourth of July weekend, when the whole town is buzzing with activity, as it is famous for holding a giant holiday parade right down Main Street. I felt fortunate to catch this glimpse of Wolfeboro and the inn when I did. Even though the town was bustling, it still felt like every detail was accounted for at Pickering House Inn and every space on the property made me feel right at home. I also made sure to enjoy the priority reservations perk at Pavilion for exceptional seasonally (and locally) driven fare, as well as my close proximity to the Sky Boutique Spa upstairs where one will experience an otherworldly facial, among other wellness therapies.

Photo credit: Lauren Wicks
Photo credit: Lauren Wicks

The common spaces are ripe with cozy, inviting chairs by original fireplaces and bookshelves filled with best-selling beach reads, mysteries, and historical accounts. The staff is both intuitive and attentive, knowing when to ask if you'd like a glass of wine and when to let the heated Scrabble game finish. Breakfast is served each morning in a light-drenched bar and kitchen, where the chef prepares a made-to-order breakfast with the freshest local ingredients, but if you're an early bird or prefer to linger in bed all morning, each floor is always stocked with coffee and freshly baked goods to grab in your slippers and return back to bed.

Photo credit: Courtesy of Pickering House Inn
Photo credit: Courtesy of Pickering House Inn

Speaking of the bedrooms, each room is spacious and full of natural light (thanks to those 93 windows), and equipped with a stately bathroom. Staying here felt like spending the weekend at a favorite aunt's vacation home but with all the amenities of a luxury boutique hotel. I could feel the history and heart of this place in each room, each staff member I encountered, and certainly in the eyes of Patty Cooke, who chatted with me while we sipped coffee in a cozy sitting area, her passion and love for this place abundantly clear. While Pickering House Inn has a fascinating history, its story is far from finished, and it is certainly worth adding to your next great New England road trip or tranquil weekend getaway to be a part of its brilliant next chapter.

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