The Thoughtfully Curated Home

Ever since I was young, I’d rearrange my room on almost a monthly basis. I loved experimenting with different layouts and the magic that came with changing up the familiar. It’s safe to say that this little ritual has carried through with me into my adulthood, and definitely into my career.

Part of the fun of being a stylist is getting to play. Each day, I find myself getting to experiment with different pieces together in new ways. I sometimes will rearrange a space 10 different ways, all to discover that it was the best the first way I had it. But for me, that is all part of the fun. Styling is such a journey – sometimes a voyage – yet in the end it produces such a magical result.

I craft our home in the same way. I love tinkering with ideas, swapping in brand new things piece by piece to see how they sit in the space. There is, and always will be, a great deal of guesswork when trying to style a space. There are a few knowns out there (thats a completely different post) however for the most part, we’re artists combining different pigments together until we produce just the right color.

I’ve struggled in the past with wanting to completely redo our whole home with the snap of a finger. This has, and will always be such an innate reaction for me. When it comes to my personal space, I’ve always craved change and results. Which makes waiting for things, and taking the patience to shop around and test things out rather tired.

However I’ve learned the hard way, that when you rush to throw a space together – simply because you’re craving change – you’ll never get the end result that you’re lusting for. Spaces take time. They take attention, layers, and great detail. Magical spaces come together over years and not days. This was SO hard for me to grasp when I moved into my first couple apartments. I would say to myself, “ok but I just need something to go here and then when we find the right thing I’ll swap it out.” HELL NO. This is not the right mentality - you know why? Because I will NEVER swap it out. It’ll take 10 years and a crowbar. So my new mentality has become – if I haven’t found it yet, it can wait. That empty corner isn’t going anywhere.

The thoughtfully curated home is one that waits. It patiently comes together over years of changing tastes, ideas and concepts. It’s an ever-evolving project that will quite simply never be done. And that’s the beauty of it. When I first started out styling, I was always waiting for the end result – which is totally normal. However when it comes to stying your own home, the end result isn’t the whole finished home. It’s instead a finished entryway table with the lamp you’ve been waiting for combined with the perfect lampshade you found 3 years ago nestled perfectly next to the vintage bust you found at a flea market in France when you were 20. You see? It’s more so about curating over time than it is an end-to-end process.

And that’s another thing, styling is by no means linear.

Sometimes you’ll find the perfect set of coasters for a table in a room you don’t even have yet. That’s ok! Get the coasters, they spoke to you. If you listen to what truly time and time again speaks to you, it’s meant to be.

I’ve spoken with dozens of clients who have been focusing on getting a space in their home redone for months now and are so tired and done with the process. The thing I like to tell them is that it’ll always be a process. A room will never be done. And when we get rid of that mentality - and start looking at our homes as a canvas on which we tinker, play and experiment everyday – the process of creating a thoughtfully curated home will be that much more tangible. Eliminate the idea that something needs an end date. Eliminate the mindset that you need to just put something there so it feels “complete”. It’ll never be complete if you just throw the first thing you stumble upon there.

We rent our current apartment and we love it dearly – however there are some confines that prohibit making it the perfect home. I can’t just go and retile the kitchen or change out the hardware in the bathroom. And that’s completely okay for now. Instead, I’m investing in key pieces that I know will make it to our one day forever home. Recently I purchased a new cane media console that I’d been yearning after for a long long time. This piece will forever be cherished and can cross function as either a media console or a credenza in a dining room one day. Either way, I love it to pieces and I’d never part ways with it. Our sofa on the other hand, I purchased from our office sample sale for $400. It’s great and I love it, but we’ll most likely upgrade when we move. So just because you’re not physically in your forever home, doesn’t mean you can’t start building it’s curated collection now.

Focus on pieces that can easily transition - pieces that can evolve and fit into a different space nicely. Mango wood is one of my favorites for this reason, it goes so so so well with light wood flooring or dark – as does burl wood.

I was having a conversation the other day and the topic of buyers remorse for furniture came up. This is such a thing, and sadly it’s super common. However its not if you focus only on the pieces that you really, truly lust after. Once something catches your eye, don’t buy it right away. Wait just a little. At least a few days. But for me, I have to wait a few months at least to test myself to make sure I really love it and would want to live with it. Do a bit of sleuthing, scour the internet for inspiration images that hold said item. Try to find it in different elements and in different lighting. The more you expose yourself to it, the odds are that you’ll fall more in love with it and that only comes with time. Don’t just “add to cart” because you saw the item on a ‘must have’ list somewhere. Get to know it a bit, take your time with it and in turn it’ll show its true self to you – which is the most magical part of curating a space!