WINNER: MARMOL RADZINER
Having worked with these clients for decades, the firm of Marmol Radziner knew what the homeowners wanted and what the house itself needed. What was once known in town as Wilshire Farm, this expansive, bucolic property features a main residence whose profile harkens to a French country house but imbued with American vernacular forms. In keeping with those cultural and historical references, the firm approached the design of every room in the main residence, the two- story guest cottage, and pool house, as a distinct living experience—but with all spaces ultimately feeling connected. They chose a variety of vintage 1950s French furnishings and reupholstered them in contemporary fabrics, while also adding in sculptural modern forms. Although every room is, at first glance, restrained in what it contains, upon closer look, a far more layered, nuanced design scheme emerges. Details such as custom millworks, a hidden bar lined with de Gournay wallpaper, French oak floors, lime plaster walls, and richly veined expanses of stone combine to create a cohesive and dynamic design. Classical ideas of symmetry and beauty prevail.
FINALIST: MELANIE FOSTER INTERIORS
As a personal art collection grows, there is the risk that the rooms of a home might come to feel like galleries in a museum. Recognizing that the enlightened homeowners of this Georgian-style home collect lots of name-brand contemporary faces and figures, as well as abstract works, one design goal of Melanie Foster Interiors was, “respect the estate’s classical proportions, while enhancing its capacity to serve as both a private gallery and a sophisticated family home.” This family now lives effortlessly—and comfortably—with their fine artworks that populate the walls of every room. Decorative wallpapers, Venetian plasterwork, and decorative paint finishes feature throughout the six-bedroom residence. But family, it seems, comes first. Ample seating areas in the living room, a tiered media room, an inviting sinuously curved sofa in the parlor, large-scale cushiony pieces in the office, a game table in the library, two tables in the dining room, and a densely configured and boldly hued seating area in the family room point to the communal, welcoming agenda for this house.
FINALIST: STEPHANIE RAPP INTERIORS
Where there is art in this home (and there is a lot of it), you notice it. That’s due, in large part, to Stephanie Rapp Interior’s expert and strategic placement of the pieces. So art-centric are these homeowners that the project was playfully dubbed “Gallery Chic.” The designer established sight lines and viewing angles to “generate an immersive gallery-like experience. Employing a neutral palette—both on the walls and for the furnishings—was a way for every artwork to emerge to full effect. Yet, this is a home for day-to-day living and not a series of sterile art galleries in the shell of a 10,000-square-foot home. Rapp has an uncanny sense of geometry in the placements of furniture: Expansive armchairs are angled in rooms to foster conversation, contemporary daybeds and curvaceous chairs invite lounging, a grid of built-in shelving functions as a hive of individual display units. Exuberantly rendered lighting fixtures do their job to illuminate, while working as sculptures in keeping with those set on pedestals and plinths.