Client Project: A Blue, Cream & Green Living Roomfeatured

It’s so fun to see a project come to life and this past weekend, Remy & I had the pleasure of installing a light and lovely living room for a client’s suburban home. The house is a traditional clapboard colonial on a sprawling parcel in Westchester County and the room we were tasked with refreshing had great bones to work with, including the original mantle, a wall of wood paneling and a beautiful bay window overlooking the gardens below.

Here is a peek at the styleboard we conjured up for this young couple with an infant daughter and two pups – they needed pretty but PRACTICAL…

…nothing fussy or overly formal. Fresh, comfortable and casual were their three commandments. Our goal was also to maximize the room’s natural light while creating the illusion of higher ceilings, since theirs were just a little over seven feet: a trademark of many century-old homes. We dressed the walls in Farrow & Ball’s Dimity, which is a creamy neutral with warm undertones that lent the space a much-needed glow. It’s also super flattering on skin tones. For the windows, we mounted big fat brass rods right beneath the moldings and hung triple-pinch pleat panels of John Robshaw’s Prasana, allowing the fabric to puddle a bit on the floor. The bay windows wore a trio of classic Roman shades.

Since the couple was hesitant to use too much color, the majority of the permanent pieces – sofa, rug, arm chairs – were clad in neutrals. We brought in pops of blue, green and blue/green with some of the more transient pieces, making this room easy to evolve as their tastes change throughout the years. We also relied on a ton of texture to add interest to the neutral – or neutral for us – palette. Loads of shagreen – from the coffee table and console to the little catchall tray – as well as mother-of-pearl, bone inlay and fringed fabric on the throw pillows. Nothing boring about this basic beige.

They didn’t want a ton of accessories, so we ended up styling the room with a variety of clippings from their lovely backyard, including my favorite last-minute add-on, a wild spray of bamboo sprigs. The perfect partner to an oversize gilt bamboo mirror that stretched from mantle to ceiling, countering the negative space of the original ash-black fireplace. The best part: the couple got to show off their new digs at a family Easter party the next day.