06.30.25

Interiors

This Interior Design Studio Firmly Rejects “Instagram Moments,” But Its Spaces Are Still Super Photogenic

Despite a wane in the curated "Instagram aesthetic," hotels and restaurants still often must rely on vignettes that guests will be inclined to photograph, post, and tag as part of their organic — and free — marketing strategies. But for New York-based Islyn Studio, the aim is to lift these guests out of their digitally oriented lives entirely, and — even if for a brief spell — focus on the sensorial value of the space they’re in. “We reject trends and ‘Instagram moments’ in favor of timelessness,” says founder Ashley Wilkins. “Our hope is that our audience is so immersed in the moment, they forget to look at their phones.”

06.25.25

Interiors

Nick Spain Designed This Massachusetts Lake House After Encouraging His Clients to Forget Everything They Thought a Lake House Ought to Be

Interior and landscape designer Nick Spain creates spaces that feel evocative of a certain period and yet out of time, never bound to an era in a retro or kitschy way. For a 1960s lakehouse in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, Spain — based in the Berkshires and Brooklyn — recently combined various references that nod to the past but live fully in the present. It’s more challenging than it looks, of course, and we wanted to know how he pulls it off.

06.10.25

Interiors

In This California Craftsman, Inspired By a Famed Copenhagen Museum, the Colors Unfold From Room to Room

Since 2021, Lisa Mayock — former co-founder of the beloved aughts fashion label Vena Cava — has been bringing her eye for shapes, proportion, pattern, and texture to interior design with Monogram. Mayock’s Altadena-based studio recently refreshed an 1890s Craftsman home in Pasadena for a family of five, and Mayock wanted the interior to reflect the “vibrant and high energy” way the family lives. While previous iterations of the space before its current residents moved in skewed more traditional — neutral palette, staid furniture arrangements — this transformation started with unexpected wall colors, inspired by Copenhagen's Thorvaldsens Museum.

04.09.25

Interiors

Think of This London Renovation As Mid-Century, Modernized

Studio Hagen Hall, an architecture and design firm in London founded by Louis Hagen-Hall, has a talent for creating spaces that are striking yet serene — making them look effortless while also paying meticulous attention to detail. For Pine Heath, a townhome that’s part of a series originally designed by South African architect Ted Levy, Benjamin & Partners in the late 1960s, Hagen Hall brings California mid-century modern to North London’s Hampstead Conservation Area.

04.02.25

Interiors

This Designer’s Interior Design Secret? Make It a Little Bit Weird

During a career spanning almost two decades, Julia King has worked for several of the interior design world’s heavy hitters — from Kelly Wearstler to Michael Smith to Charles DeLisle — and absorbed a little of each of their dramatically disparate design styles along the way. Now, after setting up her own business, Studio Roene, this aesthetic mash-up is delightfully evident in her first wave completed projects, which borrow a little of their resident’s personalities, and blend King’s eye for color and compositions of vintage and contemporary furniture. “I always try to think: ‘How can we make it a little bit weird?’” King says. “It doesn't have to be in your face, but let's just add one thing in each room that gives it a bit of funkiness.”

01.27.25

Interiors

Always Add a Bit of Black is a Rule of Thumb in Interior Design — This Space Proves Why

A gorgeous villa filled with beautiful furniture and objects is always a welcome sight. But this particular private home near Paris is an exercise in dark and light, showing exactly how the right balance of black furniture, objects and details within a bright, neutral space can be used to the fullest effect — in every room of the house. It was designed by French-Austrian designer Katja Pargger, who custom created a handful of the pieces in the double-height lounge including two semi-circular black leather sofas that organize the geometry of the space, and surround her enameled ceramic coffee tables.

12.10.24

Interiors

A Teal and Tobacco Study, a Pistachio Bedroom — David Lucido’s Sophisticated Sense of Color Makes Him One of our Favorite Interior Designers to Watch

David Lucido has a gift for combining proportion, shape, and color in ways that are sophisticated and refined but not at all stuffy. His interiors, whether residential, commercial, or in hospitality, are never overdone but also never boring; they’re just right. It’s a challenge he makes look easy, but effortlessness almost always requires a lot of effort. Lucido, who currently splits his time between Palm Beach and New York City, pulls it off by balancing a strong work ethic and meticulous attention to detail with a lack of personal pretension. “I’m not a very serious person,” he says. “It’s not surgery, so why not be a little more expressive with things?"

12.05.24

Interiors

We Did a Full Styling Makeover of Jill’s House — Courtesy of Lightology and an Epic Vintage Haul

If you're a longtime reader of Sight Unseen, it's possible you've seen some version of my house in East Hampton, from the just-moved-in IKEA-starter-kit vibe of 2014 to the post-renovation feature last year, where I revealed our baby blue kitchen and double-drenched yellow guest bath. Last month, though, Monica and I decided to give my home a new life — a styling makeover we're calling "the Sight Unseen edit," executed as part of our continued collaboration with Lightology, for which we've previously shot two other homes we outfitted with the online retailer's incredibly diverse lighting and furniture offerings. For our third in the series, we paired vintage accessories and art with beautiful, sleek pieces from Lightology's catalog to create a more sophisticated mood for my space, one befitting the vision I've always had of it as a repository for all the design work and knowledge I've collected over my 20-plus-year career.

11.12.24

Interiors

This Parisian Interior Deploys Moiré Walls and Animal-Print Rugs and Still Manages to Convey Understated Glamour

If an interior clings to any one time period or design movement, it can seem a bit like a theatrical set — not entirely real, not livable. But mix eras and a space can risk coming off as scattershot or lacking in a strong point of view. It’s a fine line to walk, but Stéphanie Lizée and Raphaël Hugot, of the Paris-based interiors studio Lizée-Hugot, do it gracefully, recently infusing a Parisian residence with an atmosphere that feels refreshed, yet grounded and enduring.

11.08.24

Interiors

Historical Moldings Meet High-Sheen Contemporary Pieces in Joris Poggioli’s Parisian Apartment

When Joris Poggioli got the keys to an apartment inside a Napoleonic-era building in Paris’s 10th arrondissement, he immediately fell for its historic charm and potential. However, the architect and designer’s own aesthetic is highly contemporary — his trademarks include cylindrical shapes, rounded edges, and high-sheen materials — so balancing this with the existing classical details took a lot of thought and consideration. Poggioli decided that the exquisitely crafted historical features should be the main character, while his interventions and additions — including many of his own furniture designs — play a supporting role in this new chapter for the space.

10.04.24

Interiors

For Design Lovers, Spencer’s is the New York Spa We’ve Been Waiting For

I've been to spas all over the world, and it's not that I'm unable to relax, per se. It's that — to be perfectly frank about my occupational hang-ups — my mind has often remained restless in waiting rooms as I silently judge a spa's design decisions, wondering why it's so hard for someone to come along and design something truly cool. From the garish, Daily Candy–era palette of Bliss spas to the grotto-esque cosplay of Great Jones, there's never been something that felt completely like a true design person's vibe — until now. The new Spencer's spa in Soho was designed by founder Ryan McCarthy in partnership with Charlotte Taylor and EBBA Architects. Enter the space, and you're greeted by a soothing, impeccably furnished lounge that's akin to stumbling into your favorite Hackney vintage shop. The whole thing makes you want to throw away your furniture and start all over with a palette of swirly Ron Arad chairs, Regency-era benches, Paul Evans–esque coffee tables, primitive abstract sculptures, and a bookcase full of vintage gems about design, art, women, wellness, tarot, and the occult.

09.05.24

Interiors

This Victorian Home in Melbourne is a Love Letter to Tile and Stained Glass

For its latest project, a full renovation and extension of a Victorian weatherboard residence in Melbourne, Australia, the team at YSG Studio — based in Sydney and founded in 2020 by Yasmine Saleh Ghoniem —was tasked with a distinct challenge. At the head of the client's family were two spouses with divergent styles: one Egyptian-Australian and drawn to the pattern, color, and shapes of Middle Eastern design; the other Danish and partial to Scandinavian minimalism. Even more? Both partners have a kind of color-blindness that makes neutral tones appear washed out. In addition to melding these two aesthetic tastes, YSG needed to make an older house complement and connect with a newer addition — the first built project to be completed by YSG’s in-house architectural team since its addition to the team in 2022. See the results after the jump!