In 1990, Innkeeper David Garbose and his partner, Jane bought the neglected Charlotte landmark, the Mt Philo Inn.
We rescue things,” says Jane Garbose, co-owner with her partner, David Garbose, of the Mt. Philo Inn. “Border collies, furniture …”
There’s actually an exhaustive list of things that she and David have rescued, including the inn itself — which isn’t an “inn” now, in the customary sense, so much as an assemblage of four spacious, impressively appointed suites that, except for shared walls and connecting foyers, are independent of one another.
“We don’t serve breakfast,” she says, by way of illustration. “We provide a complimentary breakfast basket of wonderful local products — free-range organic eggs, Vermont Coffee Co. coffee, Smoke & Cure bacon, Vermont maple syrup, Dakin Farm’s buttermilk pancake mix. Each suite has a kitchen, and people can make their own breakfasts if they want.”
But her point about rescuing things, besides Izze, the inn’s sociable border collie, is well taken. Standing in the so-called West Wing Suite of their 120-year-old building at the foot of Mt. Philo, she and David are surrounded by beautiful, restored objects with histories predating their arrival at the inn. Desks, lamps, stoves (both the heating and the cooking variety), beds, sofas — all were found on Craigslist, or at yard sales, or through the Burlington nonprofit recycling cum work-training service ReSource.
Amazingly, there’s not a trace of hodgepodge in the inn’s décor. “Jane is a fantastic designer, without a bit of pretense in her taste, so there’s a comfortableness to the place that’s really noticeable,” says Dave. “We stop and consider each purchase. Nothing is haphazard.” Jane finds a connection in her practice calling at the Mt. Philo Inn.
“There’s something intuitive about working with internal spaces — in people and in this building we have,” she says. Dave and Izze climb Mt. Philo every day