Back in 2012, while visiting one of my favourite home decor blogs, I came across the beautiful home of Erin and Ben Napier, a young couple living and working in Laurel, Mississippi. In the coming months, a friendship formed and by the time Garrett and I started planning our Honeymoon Roadtrip through the Southern US, we knew we had to stop into Laurel to visit our friends. Their upbeat attitude and pride in their community always shone through and I could hardly wait to see it all for myself.
In a sign of true Southern hospitality, what started out as stopping in to say hi, quickly turned into “ya’ll are staying over at the bed and breakfast next door and come over for dinner”, followed by a tour around the historic district the next day. Garrett and I both agree that this was one of the highlights of our trip. From the people to the beautiful homes to our amazing hosts – we fell in love with Laurel.
I’m excited to share that you can see this town too and the great folks that live there. Not only does this Southern power couple run a wedding stationery business, and two online shops, but they are also the hosts of the pilot of a new HGTV tv show, “Home Town”. If you’re a fan of Fixer Upper (Chip and Joanna Gaines were their mentors through all this), you’re going to love this new show about small towns and old houses (you know I do!).
Tune in this weekend to watch the one-hour pilot of “Home Town” on HGTV on Sunday, January 24, at noon EST/11 am Central. You can read about Erin and Ben’s experience making the pilot this summer on her blog.
Seeing the love that Erin and Ben have for their community truly inspired us to reconsider our own plans for the future and ultimately led us to the decision to move back to my own hometown, buy the farmhouse and put down roots. I hope that when you watch this show it will inspire you too!
All photos by Bethany Byrd
Wow, this looks wonderful! Thank you for the heads up Amanda, can’t wait.
Love you, friend. Thank you for this!!