By Tom Crosby

The mountains of North Carolina hold many secrets and a pleasant one is Asheville's Richmond Hill Inn, a restored mansion more than 100 years old that today offers guests AAA Four Diamond service amidst antique furnishings, southern hospitality and old-world charm.

While the pale yellow, three-story Queen Anne-style Victorian Mansion is visible high on the hillside from the opposite bank of the French Broad River, it isn't easy to find.

Visitors must first travel Riverside Drive with its dusty commercial shops and junk yard, before finding Pearson Bridge Road, crossing a concrete bridge and taking the first sharp right turn into another, more elegant world.

The Inn's entrance lies between two stone pillars, and after some twists and turns, visitors reach the top of the landscaped hill and the Victorian Porte Cochere occupied by a 1900s "lawyer's buggy," similar to the one owned by Richmond Pearson, who built Richmond Hill in 1889.

Today, Richmond Hill covers 50 acres, with a 3/4-mile walking trail that winds through 40 acres of woodlands.

Fresh mountain air, the fast-flowing French Broad River below, the mountains in the distance, the fragrance of surrounding pine trees, the chattering brook, the heady aroma of flowers in bloom - all contribute to Richmond Hill's theme as described by current owner Dr. Albert Jake Michel: "Romance is encouraged every moment."

"We don't want planned activities," said Dr. Michel. "We want our guests to relax." Available to guests are a walking tour brochure of the gardens, a multi-day calendar of events for the area, and listings for antique shops, area attractions, historic sites, and arts and craft stores.

Richmond Hill's gardens alone are a worthy destination and to the left of the Porte Corche entry is the Sidney Lanier garden honoring the poet who camped on Richmond Hill in 1881 trying to regain his failing health. Two benches offer reflection amidst surrounding zinnias, globefowers, spider flowers, foxgloves, delphiniums and hollyhocks.

Through the Porte Cochere, a gray, wrap-around, wooden veranda encircles the mansion. Next to the entrance marked by 12-foot-high double wooden doors, are metal plates noting the mansion is on the Department of Interior's National Register of Historic Places and is an Asheville Buncombe County Historic Site.

Most visitors are unaware the 750-ton mansion sits 600 feet east of its original location, moved in 1984 to avoid being demolished. It was rescued in 1987 when it was purchased by Dr. Michel and his wife, Marge, founders of The Education Center Inc. In Greensboro, NC and restored at a cost of $3 million. It was opened as an Inn Sept. 22, 1989, when Dr. Michel "threw away the key" and said the Inn would never again be closed to the public.

Inside, on the right is the entrance to the front parlor - a sitting room for Gabrielle's (the Inn's AAA Four Diamond-rated restaurant) - and on the left, entrance to an intimate and warm library.

The Inn's magnificent lobby, known as Oak Hall, features a 12-foot high ceiling with exposed oak beams. The carved native oak raised paneling on the walls provides a soft ambiance, augmented by a coal gas fireplace, above which hangs a portrait of Gabrielle Pearson, Richmond's wife.

Surrounded by black marble tile, the fireplace is flanked by carved wooden pedestal lamps and a pair of stuffed love seats.

On the opposite wall, a portrait of the Pearsons' son, Thomas (who died unexpectedly at 14 years of age), in a sailor's suit overlooks a couch and two stuffed chairs around an antique Oriental tea table.

The lobby floor cover is a hand-woven, 32-foot-long, patterned wool rug made in Fletchter, North Carolina.

On each side of the front entrance hangs a pair of full-length portraits of the Michels, each above a wooden bureau topped with decorater lamps and cream-colored ceramic soup tureens from Denmark.

The front door rests beneath a half-moon window with mullion windows on each side.

Further into the Oak Lobby, a grand oak staircase makes several turns as it heads to the second floor, illuminated by three tall windows with original multi-colored stained glass windowpanes. A small conceirge desk at the end of the lobby serves as the check-in desk.

Next to the desk, an eight-foot-tall antique grandfather clock sits next to a glass display case stocked with Richmond Hill memento items for sale.

LIBRARY
With 200 of the books from the original 3,000 owned by Richmond Pearson and more modern books about western North Carolina and native authors, the library offers a relaxing venue, with native North Carolina pine wearing a walnut stain on the walls and yet another fireplace, this one rimmed with blue marble tile.

Brown leather chairs and a couch, a glass-covered coffee table ready for action with pewter figures on a chess board add to the ambiance of a reading/relaxation room with several shelves of glass-enclosed books.

A waist-high glass display case contains original cups and saucers from the Inn, Pearson's bible, Persian tea cups, stationery holder, snuff box, letter holder and other antiques. A wooden tea caddy sits next to a potted fern and an old ship's compass rests atop an 1940's-style music Victrola.

Twelve-foot-high ceilings, four- to ten-foot-high windows and a red Karastan oriental rug in a multi-colored Kirman pattern add to the library's intimate and historical feel.

FRONT PARLOR
A baby grand piano dominates the six-sided, russet-colored front parlor, where guests can sit on stuffed leather chairs or a couch and gaze out three 10-foot-tall windows by day or listen at night to pianist Christopher Leonard, who plays Thursday through Monday nights beginning at 7 p.m.

A coal gas fireplace offers warmth beneath a carved white mantelpiece. Unused pocket doors are available to seal the room.

GALLERY HALL
Going straight through the lobby, Gallery Hall passes the check-in desk to reveal a private dining room on the left that seats 16. On the hall walls are photos of the Pearson family in the 1890's and a singular event on July 4, 1890 when Richmond Pearson hired 1,000 men for a silver dollar each to build one mile of road to the estate in one hour.

Awards and plaques from Zagat's Survey, AAA and Wine Spectator also adorn the walls.

The hall ends in an elegant 900-square-foot octagonal ball room with 10-foot windows, brass English wall lamps and light-red wall paper above five-and-a-half-foot-high North Carolina pine wainscotting.

GABRIELLE'S
The Inn's highly respected fine dining restaurant (it is a AAA rated Four Diamond) is on the right behind the Gallery Hall walls. See the separate description under Gabrielle's on this Web site.

THE BUILDINGS
Richmond Hill could be described as three properties, because different atmospheres and styles dominate the rooms in three separate buildings - the Mansion, the Croquet Cottages and the Garden Pavilion.

THE MANSION
Twelve guest rooms exist in The Mansion, which is the original house, although restored, modified and modernized for its role today. Each room is uniquely shaped and decorated with antiques and fine furnishings. They are each named after an historic figure associated with the Pearson family or after a noted writer from the area.

The Gabrielle Pearson room is her original bedroom and offers a sample of what a guest may expect.

The seven-sided room contains a four-poster canopy bed with a down comforter and six decorator pillows, a writing desk beneath a gold gilded mirror, a damask couch, two stuffed chairs and an enormous circular footstool, all resting on a Siseler rug.

The armoire holds a television offering 57 stations. The bedside radio serves as a CD player, alarm clock and radio. (One CD is by Gabrielle's pianist, Christopher Leonard.)

Antiques are placed about the room, along with coffee table magazines such as Conde Nast, Our State and American Heritage. Every room has books that deal with romance, history or stories about North Carolina.

The second floor has seven rooms with a common hallway refrigerator stocked with complimentary soft drinks and ice. A glass display case holds three shelves of antique dolls. Four rooms have fireplaces.

At the top of the third floor (once the attic), a sitting area serves as a gathering place for all five rooms (no fireplaces).

CROQUET COTTAGES
Four duplex cottages and one stand-alone, make up the five Croquet Cottages and nine rooms that face the zero-degree elevation, Pencrot creeping bent grass, immaculately maintained croquet lawn.

Each room has a different color scheme but all have gas coal fireplaces, Shaker beds, tables and furniture. The floors are covered with Berber, wall-to-wall carpet and each room's walls have original watercolors by local artists.

Built in 1992, the cottages have coffee makers with La Matina coffee or Earl Grey and Lemon Spice tea. Refrigerators are stocked with eight free soft drinks. Skylights illuminate the separate shower and tub in the bathrooms, outfitted with brass hardware.

In the rear, a curved and covered concrete walkway with green pillars encircles the cottages and the opening beyond the shrubbery shows the original location of the Mansion before it was moved.

On the front porches, rocking chairs overlooking the croquet lawn offer respite surrounded by moon vine, morning glory, hyacinth bean and other greenery. Each cottage is named for a native North Carolina shrub or tree.

GARDEN PAVILION
Going from The Mansion to the Pavilion, one encounters a mountain brook flowing gently downward through a series of small pools beside a stone stairway bracketed by shrub and tree plantings such as viburnums, heaths, heathers, stewartia trees and mock oranges.

The man-made brook carries 90 gallons of water a minute into a 14 foot-wide and 9-foot-tall waterfall beneath an elevated stone terrace that offers a panoramic view of the period-style Parterre Garden, so called because of its simple, geometric landscape.

Embedded with Victorian era plants - or those similar to it - the garden's manicured winter hedges are overrun in summer by beds of annuals and towering perennials with cool, pastel colors. In autumn, flowering cherry trees and Korean dogwoods add height along with tree roses, cardoon, hollyhocks, wormwood, tree hydrangeas, joe-pye weed, lavatera, garden phlox and zinnias.

Benches in the garden and ground floor porches with rocking chairs provide resting and reflection stops. A full-time horticulturist, Hunter Stubbs, oversees the grounds year-round.

Built in 1996, the Pavilion has 15 rooms, as well as Butterfield's Gift Shop on the rear ground floor, where Richmond Hill logo items can be purchased, such as a $155 robe or $12.50 greeting cards.
Modern and spacious, the Pavilion rooms have different color schemes with white trim, patterned wall-to-wall carpeting, two stuffed chairs with a footrest, writing desk, and gas coal fireplaces with mantle shelves. English prints hang from the walls and the armoire - with television - is built into the wall.

All Pavilion rooms overlook the garden with windows that can be shuttered shut from inside.

Bathroom amenities in all Richmond Hill's 36 rooms include Caswell Massey shower cap, perfumed soap, Neutrogena soap, hand and body emulsion, foaming bath gel and botanical conditioning shampoo.

Second-floor Pavilion bathrooms have skylights; those on the first floor have verandas.

GARDEN PAVILION DINING ROOM
The dining room, where a gourmet breakfast is offered complimentary, is on the floor above the gift shop. The 65-seat dining room, which has an open kitchen, provides lovely views of the garden through 30 six-foot-high mullioned windows. (The best seats are not next to the window, but those one or two back so that diners can get a panoramic view of the garden.)

Breakfast eaters may receive a personal greeting from Dr. Michel, a free copy of USA Today, and an extensive breakfast ala carte menu to choose from. Syracuse white china and Sambonet cutlery on white linen make breakfast an elegant meal.

Pavilion rooms are named for North Carolina events, authors, places and Pearson and Michel relatives. For example, the Cardinal Room is named after the state bird, the Princeton Room after the college Richmond Pearson graduated from with honors in 1872 and the Chess Game Room to honor the famous match between the U.S. Congress (where Pearson served in the House) and the British House of Commons played by transatlantic cable. It ended in a tie. Each room has an information sheet about the room's name.

Special amenities: afternoon tea with fresh pastries in The Mansion, gourmet breakfast in the sunny Garden pavilion restaurant, free soft drinks, free USA Today newspaper, turndown service with chocolates with photo of Richmond Hill on the wrapper, free guide to Select Registry of Hotels with the Richmond Hill page marked, mountain breezes, Gabrielle's Restaurant with mountain views, benches in the gardens, rocking chairs on The Mansion and Croquet Cottage porches, brochures for numerous area activities/shops, personal welcome by owner for breakfast (when he is there) and the flowers in spring that even an Englishman would envy.