Former HGTV couple lovingly preserves oldest homes in Mass.

Home Improvement

The former “Houses with History” hosts now share their restorations of Massachusetts homes dating back 300 years on YouTube.

Growing up in Sandwich, Mike Lemieux and Jen Macdonald knew each other from school, but after “one awkward date,” they went their separate ways.

Both eventually landed finance jobs in Boston while secretly pining away for their true love: real estate.

Then one day in 2010, they both ended up at the same cookout. Talk turned to local real estate— specifically a beauty they’d each eyed in Kingston. They were smitten with the house — and each other.

The couple founded Full Circle Homes in Plympton. Their passion for lovingly restoring antique homes burned so fierce, it landed them on HGTV for two seasons.

“Houses With History,” streaming on HGTVgo, HBOMax, and Discovery+, saw the New Englanders restoring centuries-old homes around Massachusetts. With no new seasons planned, “We took the bull by the horns and launched our own YouTube channel,” said Lemieux, a general contractor and history buff. On “Full Circle Homes – Mike and Jenny,” viewers “can follow along and see everything that they saw on HGTV, but with more behind-the-scenes footage and detail.”

Currently, you can watch them work on a 300-year-old house in Dartmouth, a 300-year-old Rochester antique Cape, and a circa-1700 Cape in Plympton.

The couple moved to Plympton in 2015, and they have “been doing house restorations since we’ve been dating — about 15 years,” said Macdonald. One house turned into another. With fuzzy nostalgia, they recall their “first flip.”

“Mike got his general contracting license. I started getting more in depth with interior design, and it just grew from there,” said Macdonald. “We learned a lot from working on our own projects, and then we started taking on client projects, and now we’ve worked on, geez, I don’t even know … maybe 50-plus mostly antique homes on the South Shore, South Coast, and Cape Cod.”

“Many projects that people would tear down,” added Lemieux.

The two often finish each other’s sentences and laugh at something the other said. Through it all, their shared passion for restoring Massachusetts homes shines through.

They talked with the Globe about old homes, current projects, their process, tips, and more.

What do you love about antique homes?

Lemieux: You’re taking something that’s got ties to not only the history of the community, but many times, the history of the United States. You’re doing an archeological exploration of the chain of ownership, and you not only become part of that chain, but get to explore it with the community. It’s the connective tissue of the community.

You look at these structures — 250, 300 years old — and realize that what we think is hard today, with all the technology we have, these people were just building these properties out of nothing. They had to mill the trees and find the tools. It’s a reminder of what it took to build this nation.

Macdonald: Ditto on everything Mike said. It would be easy to demolish the house and put up a McMansion. But the homes are part of the fabric of the community. They have character. I love not only learning the history of the house, but solving the puzzle: How can I make this house functional for the family? How do we do a bathroom and make it feel like it’s always been here?

What are you working on now?

Macdonald: For clients, we have a 300-year-old house in Dartmouth and a 300-year-old house in Dennis both getting new foundations. We have a 300-year-old house in Brewster. Then we have our own projects going. We’re working on a schoolhouse we bought off Middlesborough for $1 (1890s Rock Village Schoolhouse).

Lemieux: A town RFP (request for proposals).

Macdonald: It was a blind bidding (auction), and we won. That one we’ve been working on for a couple years.

Tell me about the Dartmouth project.

Lemieux: It’s tough to tell the exact year, but it goes back to the early 1700s at least. It comes under FEMA regulations, because the Slocum River goes right in there. So we had to not only try to preserve as much of the property as we could, but we lifted the whole house and put it on a FEMA-approved foundation.

We’re doing full soup to nuts on that. We’re leaving as much intact as we can, but the house was in really bad shape. We’re lifting it, excavating, putting it back onto a brand new foundation, and we’re going to rebuild the historic chimney with working fireplaces. We’re going to do every detail that clients wanted, and also keep the details that the Historic District wanted, so that the house looks much the same way it has for the last 300 years.

Do you live in a historic home?

Macdonald: Our office and our store, Mayflower Mercantile in Plympton, dates to 1827. But we actually live in a badly done 1970s Garrison Colonial. We’re trying to make it look like an antique reproduction.

What are some problems historical homes typically face?

Macdonald: As a real estate agent, I see people get scared of historic signs on houses. There’s a lot of confusion around historic restrictions. Sometimes just seeing the sign with a name and year on the front of a house, people pull out of driveways, like, “Oh, I can’t deal with this.” So it’s just explaining to them so that they’re not afraid of those things.

Lemieux: Installing modern HVAC. You don’t want it to be visible, or interrupt the aesthetic of the home. You need to have the right mindset, and the right techniques.

What advice do you have for people interested in buying a historic home?

Lemieux: When you buy an older home, experience it, live in it for a while, and then make decisions, rather than just saying “Gut the whole thing and start over.” When you hire a contractor or a service provider, make sure they have experience in dealing with historic property. A lot of times we get in there after they’ve hired somebody without experience, and we have to correct issues.

What’s a favorite project?

Macdonald: The Deacon Eldred house in Sandwich. We rent it out now on Airbnb and Vrbo. Growing up, it was the Thornton W. Burgess Museum. My mother and my grandmother worked there, so I had been all throughout that house. It had just been sitting there for 30 years, melting into the ground. The town put it up for request for proposals. We won the bid. It’s just the cutest house. I love it.

This interview has been lightly edited and condensed.

Lauren Daley is a freelance culture writer. She can be reached at [email protected]. She tweets @laurendaley1, and Instagrams at @laurendaley1.

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