Ohara Davies-Gaetano Delivers European
Elegance to Big Sky Country
Old West meets Old World in this rugged-yet-sumptuous lake house
on the shore of Montana’s Flathead Lake.
by Vicky Lowry
For the past eight years, Ohara Davies-Gaetano has split her time between Southern
California, where her interior design practice is based, and northwestern Montana, where
she and her husband and their young son enjoy the outdoor life on a 50-acre property on
Flathead Lake. “Our hearts and souls are there,” Davies-Gaetano says of the latter.
So, when a Dallas couple asked her a few years ago to handle the interiors of their own
Montana residence, under construction on the shore of the 30-mile-long lake, she readily
accepted the commission. Their vision, however, initially caused her concern. “They
wanted Montana-meets-Lake-Como, and my first thought was, ‘Oh, this could go really
wrong,’ ” Davies-Gaetano recalls with a laugh.
Photo by Lisa Romerein
Ohara Davies-Gaetano designed the interiors of a 9,000-square-foot house on Montana’s Flathead Lake,
deploying her signature European sophistication and rough-hewn materials (portrait by Lisa Romerein). Top:
In the great room, a custom-made sofa upholstered in a Colefax and Fowler linen mingles with a cerused-
oak lounge chair from 1stDibs attributed to René Gabriel. The 18TH-CENTURY FIREPLACE is flanked by an
ANTIQUE CHEST and a 17TH-CENTURY OAK TRUNK; the painting by Nick Gaetano, Davies-Gaetano’s father,
swings open to reveal a TV.
It didn’t go wrong, not in the least — because Davies-Gaetano has built a career on
imbuing homes, especially newly constructed ones, with depth and soul. In the expressive
interiors she conceives, her innately stylish eye is immediately apparent in their use of
reclaimed materials, rough-hewn textures, subdued earthy hues and mostly European
antiques that seem basked in warmth and light.
Davies-Gaetano never formally studied the decorative arts, but creativity and an artistic
aesthetic are in her DNA. Her father is a painter, her mother a weaver. She spent the first
14 years of her life in New York City before the family moved to rural North Carolina. Fun
fact: She got her name from a meat-packing truck emblazoned with the words O’Hara
Wholesale Meats that had caught her father’s eye.
A tall iron-framed window in the
entry offers a pictorial view of the
lake. The 1940s Oushak rug and
19th-century French bronze
lantern are both from 1stDibs.
Davies-Gaetano designed the
bench.
In her 20s, she opened a home-furnishings business with her husband in Dallas. As neither
of them proved particularly interested in retail, Davies-Gaetano started picking up small
interior design projects — decorating a room here and there. She launched a full-scale
design studio in California in 2009.
Since then, Davies-Gaetano has created incandescent interiors in stylish retreats up and
down the Pacific coast, in the Rocky Mountains and the Caribbean and along Florida’s
Atlantic shore. In 2018, she won the Andrew Martin Interior Designer of the Year Award —
known as the Oscars of the interior design world.
Nature reigns in the spacious kitchen, which includes a custom walnut-slab table that seats at least eight
and a chandelier bursting with metal leaves.
All her projects are replete with eye-pleasing materials and carefully considered details.
“I’ve made it my mission to create authentic, soulful design in a bespoke manner,” she
says. “We ask our clients lots of questions: ‘What can we do so that every aspect of the
design enhances the experience?’ ‘What does it sound like when you are moving through
the house?’ ‘Do you like the lights on really bright, as that affects the surface of the walls?’
The materials are integral to what we create and how people connect to the spaces.
How we feel things emotionally and physically in our homes is incredibly important.”
Left: Between the great room and the kitchen, a small vignette includes a squat vintage chair, an antique
chest of drawers from Obsolete and a mirror, vase and pedestal sourced by the designer. Right: A corner
rotunda facing the sunset boasts a circular honed-wood bar with a copper countertop, Paula Rosales stools,
sconces from Lumfardo Luminaires, a chandelier from Obsolete, a walnut ceiling and a wall of windows.
The owners of the 9,000-square-foot, five-bedroom Montana lake house wanted it to feel
connected to the landscape, and to be livable, comfortable and fun, especially when
filled with family and friends. Surfaces needed to be sturdy. Nothing should feel precious.
With this in mind, Davies-Gaetano introduced durable architectural elements outside and
in. Some, like the weathered-wood beams for the ceilings, are Old West, but the majority
have old-world origins, including the 18th-century rubble stone and reclaimed bricks used
for the portico and loggias and the French plaster stucco on the walls. All the flooring is
18th-century reclaimed oak sourced in Europe, and most of the antique bedroom doors
are French and Italian.
An antique French mirror and a rustic 18th-century
Swedish sideboard grace this powder room.
Davies-Gaetano visits Europe several times a year, not only to hunt for such finds but also
to seek inspiration — “for my own need of being enlightened and instilled with a drive to
create something authentic,” she says.
The house’s rooms are filled with genuine treasures, even the smallest spaces, such as a
powder room that’s graced with an ornate antique French mirror and a rustic 18th-
century Swedish sideboard from 1stDibs. The entry features two other 1stDibs discoveries: a
1940s Oushak rug and a 19th-century French bronze lantern.
The rugged bunk room sleeps four, while a vintage stool and 1950s rope chair make it feel homey.
In the great room, which is outfitted in subdued hues that reflect the natural world seen
through iron-framed glass doors overlooking the lake, a custom-made sofa upholstered in
a Colefax and Fowler linen joins a cerused-oak lounge chair from 1stDibs attributed to the
French 20th-century decorative artist René Gabriel.
A tranquil painting by Nick Gaetano, Davies-Gaetano’s father, swings open on piano
hinges to reveal a TV. The 18th-century fireplace is flanked by an antique chest from
Horsch & Huebscher and a 17th-century oak trunk.
Le: In the primary bedroom are 18th-century Italian painted doors, a tapestry from Seref Ozen Tribal Rugs and
Texles and a sculptural table lamp. Right: This cabana includes a 17th-century Spanish wring table, a Dear Keaton
chair, a 1970s Swedish pine stool and a Diego Giacome tête de femme–style oor lamp (the last two items from
1stDibs), plus Schumacher curtains.
The primary suite really does look as if it could be ensconced in a villa perched above Lake
Como, thanks to timeless plaster walls and 18th-century Italian painted doors that Davies-
Gaetano retrofitted for the space.
The simple furnishings include a table lamp from Lucca Antiques and a tapestry from Seref
Ozen Tribal Rugs and Textiles.
Davies-Gaetano custom designed the hefty table on the lakeside terrace. The English verdigris copper
lanterns came from 1stDibs.
The bar, situated in a glass-wrapped, walnut-domed rotunda, is the cornerstone of the
house when the sun sets. Davies-Gaetano fashioned a gleaming copper counter and
ringed it with comfy stools by Paula Rosales that she covered in a verdant Jerry Pair
leather. After all, entertainment of a high order is earned after a day of hiking, fishing and
outdoor play in Big Sky country.
“The family opens all the doors, the kids are jumping on sofas, the bar gets danced on —
you name it,” says Davies-Gaetano. “The house has fun.”
