What’s the story behind some of the furniture and decor?
Everything in the living room, I really tried to stay true to that vibe of 1970s [Italy]. I have these sculptural burl side tables that I am in absolute love with and have been holding on to forever and waiting for the perfect place to put them. I love the carpet from Woven, the pile is just so yummy. Those palm trees are obviously vintage too and those are just special pieces of art. Sarah Ellison does a good job, her pieces do feel timeless. Although they’re very much on trend, it’s more because they’re beautiful versus following a trend. Her pieces also could be almost any era, her Float sofa could literally be the ’70s, ’80s, 2000s, whatever. That’s what I invest in and recommend to my clients.
One of my favorite things in that room really is my big huge oversized picture of YSL because he is my muse. When I got this house I had those pictures in my head with all the wood and tones and coloring. To be totally honest, I did design that room around those photoshoots, I picked out pieces based on his living room even though mine feels more modern. I was very inspired by that.
How do you navigate the fine line between inspiration and imitation?
When I’m doing mood boards for myself or clients it’s more metaphorical and poetic because I personally want to start with the romance and the story of ideas before I lean into the look of things…. I would never want to do a room that was similar to someone else. There’s so much stuff fed to us nowadays too that we don’t even realize we’re consuming all this information and all these things. That’s why I intentionally start with obscure things that have nothing to do with interiors because I want to build from that. For me personally, design is soulful. Take your time, you don’t want to follow trends, you want to follow your desires.
I always tell people to get to know yourself, sit with it for a little bit, and create a mood board not based on other people’s work or other interiors that [you] won’t be able to emulate in your house. Rather than that, go down the path of what are my favorite colors, textures, and shapes? Once you establish what turns you on essentially then you slowly lean into that and find those things. When people rush, all the stuff ends up leaving their home a year later, it really does. Timeless is what you want to invest in, and I’m not even talking investment monetarily wise—it’s more like what are you going to like looking at for a long time so that you don’t just buy a bunch of crap and put it into landfill or spend all this money.
