Life Imitates Art at the Georgia Home of Painter Teil Duncan Henley

There are gallery walls, and then there are the artist Teil Duncan Henley’s gallery walls. “I can’t get enough of it,” Teil says of the artwork that dominates the family room of the Columbus, Georgia, home she shares with her husband, professional golfer Russell Henley, and their three children—a showstopping arrangement of large-scale abstracts, moody still lifes, cheerful florals, and loose figure studies, her own and others’. “For special occasions, I almost always ask Russ for more art.” There are other overt clues that would make it easy to guess the homeowners’ professions—like the putting greens in the backyard and in the upstairs playroom. But it’s the layers of everyday life underneath (their seven-year-old’s Hot Wheels mingled with Russell’s numerous PGA trophies) that reflect the couple’s true priority.

In 2018, the impending arrival of their second child sparked a move from Charleston, South Carolina, to Teil’s hometown of Columbus, where the couple had met four years prior at her sister’s wedding. “My sister and I are best friends who married best friends,” Teil says. So it wasn’t a huge shock when her sister and brother-in-law scooped up the house next door to the lot the Henleys had purchased near the Chattahoochee River. Soon, both her brother’s family and her parents secured the other adjacent homes on the short, shady street.

“Our kids are more like siblings, they spend so much time together,” Teil says. It’s exactly the kind of joyful chaos—all crowded tables and sticky fingers—she envisioned when she and her dad, who acted as project manager while the couple crisscrossed the country with the PGA Tour, sat down with local architect Jack Jenkins and interior designer Leslie Wolfe. Teil “wanted the house to feel collected, not too shiny and new and not so precious that the kids couldn’t have free range,” says Wolfe, who oversaw the home’s layout, finishes, and initial design. Russell, who grew up in nearby Macon, had a wish list centered on an outdoor cooking space and plenty of storage for the abundance of clubs, bags, and sponsored clothing that comes with being one of the top-ranked golfers in the world. “Mostly, though, I just wanted Teil to love it,” he says.

Warm wooden elements from Foster Wood Products in Shiloh, Georgia—including naturally stained cypress kitchen cabinetry, the trophy room’s cypress-paneled walls, reclaimed Douglas fir beams in the living room, and oak floors throughout—imbued character into the new build. A deft mix of contemporary furnishings and heirloom pieces passed down from Teil’s parents, along with the myriad bookshelves Wolfe carved out for Teil’s large trove of books and art, underscore the home’s cozy, collected quality.

The artist’s cottage behind the house—HQ for Teil’s expanding projects, which, in addition to original paintings, now include textiles and wallpapers in her signature colorful style—took inspiration from Wolfe’s own workspace as well as the studio of fellow Georgia artist Susan Hable. Teil and Wolfe planned the space with whitewashed gallery-style walls, tall ceilings, and oversize windows that maximize natural light. “I loved how [Hable] covered the exterior of her workshop in flowers,” says Teil, who planted a tangle of hot pink Peggy Martin roses around her own cottage.

With two children under two and two skyrocketing careers, the couple’s first few years in the new house were a haze of diaper changes, airport runs, and precious studio time. “I knew the house wasn’t finished, but we were drowning in babies,” Teil says. After their third child was born in 2022, the family settled into the rhythms of the home and finally felt ready to fill the remaining gaps. “I wanted to add an edge to the decor while maintaining comfort,” she says. She turned to Charleston-based interior designer Jenny Keenan, who relished the task of pushing Teil not so much out of her comfort zone but back into it. “Teil has no inhibition in her work; even in the artwork she collects, she gravitates toward color,” Keenan says. “But she had been a little more restrained with her interiors.”

In the family room, the epicenter of the Henley home, the large, colorful gallery wall provided a natural touchstone for Keenan and her team. For Teil, “art is definitely king,” Keenan says. There, patterned throw pillows in luxe performance fabrics (three children do live here), a reeded coffee table, a pair of blush table lamps, and an onion-shaped basket light match the energy of the dynamic collection.

In the primary bedroom, neutral grass-cloth walls add textural interest, balancing bolder punches found in the rugs and upholstery, including a pair of midcentury armchairs in a Fermoie deco stripe and a sleek sofa in a surprisingly masculine mauve. Keenan wasn’t afraid to amp up the volume, introducing whimsy whenever possible. “Once they go for it, clients rarely regret going big with color and pattern,” she says. The Henleys certainly haven’t, and as Teil’s professional line of wallpapers and textiles has expanded, she has layered even more pattern into the mix.

When asked, though, Teil credits many of the smaller, unexpected touches with making the biggest impact—a pair of hot pink orchid–printed vintage Parsons chairs in the foyer, for instance, or kitchen barstools as practical as they are pretty, covered in a vinyl-coated Rebecca Atwood geometric fabric. It finally feels like home. “My work often involves various artistic styles,” Teil says. “There are layers of abstraction, impressionism, and tight detail. Now home embodies the same thing—colorful and contemporary with plenty of warm, familiar elements.”