There was an unseen client very much involved in the renovation of a certain West End Avenue apartment. And, yet, this silent figure had a strong voice in how the apartment’s new floorplan was to be devised and, even, in how the furniture would be arranged. Although neither the clients—a husband and wife with two children—nor the architect or interior designer ever met the invisible personage, he/she remained ever present.
“The moment I told my mother, who’s Chinese, that my husband and I were going to renovate our apartment, she said, ‘Don’t do that! You’ll risk offending the Kitchen God,’” says the homeowner wife. “That reference goes back to the Chinese superstition that if life is going well in a home and in a family, as ours was at the time and still is, you don’t want to literally move the stove for fear of upsetting things.”
Such concepts are related to the better-known discipline known as feng shui, whereby furnishings and mirrors, along with doorways and windows, need to be arranged in such a way that no menacing spirits or bad energy forces are tempted to visit. Indeed, when architect Ward Welch and Erin Fearins, his interior designer business partner at Studio SFW (the firm’s other partner is Rachael Stollar), began gutting the apartment and furnishing it, they heeded the client’s penchant for observing such ancient Chinese customs. They even enlisted Catherine Brophy, known as The Feng Shui Detective, to help ensure that all placements would be right.
When Welch reconfigured the floorplan, the homeowner showed the drawings to her mother, who lives in New Jersey, but spends many nights in the apartment, helping to cook and visit with her two grandchildren. “After I gave the plans to my mother, she showed it to an aunt and uncle, known for their fortune-telling skills, and all of them said the floorplan made sense.” Demolition began and the spirits, including the Kitchen God, were likely watching as the apartment came together.
In the foyer, walls painted in Benjamin Moore’s Black Raspberry are a perfect backdrop for a vintage Maison Jansen cabinet from 1stDibs.
The library’s walls are covered in a high-gloss lacquer in Benjamin Moore’s Pomegranate shade. Artworks by Liu Kun hang above a sofa by Ferrell Mittman.
Pictured in the dining room are designers Rachael Stollar, Ward Welch, and Erin Fearins.
In the powder room, a vintage Emil Stejnar mirror from 1stDibs hangs above a vanity basin from Drummonds.
The primary bedroom features an ottoman from Hickory Chair and a nightstand from Made Goods.
A guest bedroom includes bed linens from Matouk. The curtain fabric is by Braquenié.
In a guest bath, the vanity is from Pilaster Inc., and the wall tile is from Pratt + Larson.
Because the apartment was actually three apartments made into one over the years, it was “a rabbit’s warren of rooms,” says Welch. “You’d actually get lost in it.” The homeowner concurs by adding, “Our apartment before didn’t make any sense, and I told Ward and Erin to just give me three choices for everything they chose, so as to make it easier to go forward.” Although lots of walls came down, others went up. “I like rooms. I like apartments with rooms, as do the clients, and I like to create apartments that feel like houses,” Ward emphasizes. “Erin and I worked to make this apartment cohesive and as understandable and logical as a house.”
Among the chief concerns, given the frequent meals of fragrant Chinese cuisine, the homeowners wanted to ensure that the kitchen be a wholly contained space. It needed to be accessible, of course, to the dining room, a new pantry, and a hallway, while also remaining a place that kept heat, smoke, and odors confined.
While aromas were not welcomed, colors were. “When I told Erin and Ward that I really liked color, their faces lit up,” says the homeowner. “I can’t stand beige and gray, plus I don’t like the idea of an all-white open-plan great room. Who wants to see dirty dishes while you’re sitting on a living room sofa?”
Fearins responded to the color cue by infusing rooms of the now well-ordered apartment with vibrant jewel-like tones. A glossy aubergine was chosen for the foyer that keys visitors to a kaleidoscope of colors elsewhere. A deep red in the family den/ library is as warm as fire, a key feng shui element. A blue kitchen (perhaps the Kitchen God’s favorite hue?) was configured to be as maintenance-free as possible, with a wipeable countertop and backsplash. A corner of the dining room, wrapped with a green sectional, is backdropped by a Fromental wallpaper that harkens to Asian themes. “We’ve been here a couple of years now,” says the homeowner, “but every time I walk into the apartment I feel that I’m entering a jewel box.”
Meanwhile, the Kitchen God is happy, too, for the new stove is exactly where the old one had been before the renovation began.