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In the master bedroom, zebra-print Pottery Barn bedding adorns a Mitchell Gold bed. Thomas O’Brien’s Aero lamps sit on side tables from Design Solutions in New Canaan, Connecticut. Across the room.
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One day, you look in the mirror and realize it’s time for a facelift—of your interiors, that is. After the empty-nester owner of this century-old Mediterranean in Chappaqua saw how designer Shelley Morris transformed her daughter’s Manhattan apartment, she hired Morris to give her family home a refreshed, more youthful look. As Morris puts it, “She hadn’t done any interior design work for some twenty years.” Morris pulled out wall-to-wall carpeting, refinished the wood floors underneath, and painted the 12-inch-thick plaster walls in a warm, understated palette that she punctuated with pops of more vibrant colors, including orange. She brought in new furniture with a modern, transitional style and replaced heavy silk drapes with bamboo shades. Still, Morris says, “there was a lot there that was salvageable, still very pretty and very relevant.” The dining room was transformed primarily with accessories, while, in a sitting room, Morris kept the decades-old brown floral wallpaper. “Every house needs one dark room,” the homeowner recalls. “Shelley updated it with chartreuse chairs and repainted the trim to pick up a color in the wallpaper.” Morris also believes every home could use something wild (“I have a bit of an animal fetish”), so she added zebra-patterned accents (stair runner, pillows, bedding), along with a few ethnic accessories for a “more global, organic quality. I love the contrast of primitive with things that are polished. Contrast is what creates excitement; that adds more depth to interior.”
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In the living room, Morris kept it simple, mixing a clean-lined linen sofa and armchairs from Verellen with an earthier Lillian August coffee table and ottoman, all grounded by a patterned sisal rug from Michaelian & Kohlberg. Contemporary accessories add sheen.
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Flotaki pillows from Dovecoat in Westport, Connecticut, soften up matching Miles van der Rohe reproduction chairs. The mantle mirror is from Pimlico in New Canaan. Old wallpaper came down; neutral paint went up. “I like Donald Kauffman colors,” says Morris. “They’re fool-proof, and the natural light does interesting things to the color throughout the day.”
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In the dining room, Morris kept the owner’s chandelier and Barbara Barry table and chairs and credenza, freshening the space with new paint and candlesticks and accessories from Bungalow in Westport.
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Designer:
SHELLEY MORRIS
Shelley Morris Interiors
New Canaan, CT
(208) 801-9911
shelleymorrisinteriors.com
Photographer: Phillip Ennis
