Since most of my clients live in New York City, many of them come to me complaining that their apartments feel like storage units, with some furniture thrown in to the middle of their “stuff”.

This client was a voracious reader and had a bedroom that was filled floor to ceiling with books covering virtually every inch of wall space. She felt that while she loved her books, she didn’t really like having them in the bedroom.

During Construction: Stage Two

She said she wanted something warm, inviting and sexy – something that was feminine but someplace that a man would feel comfortable in – “a space that wasn’t too girly”.

I covered the walls in a sumptuous dark brown (Benjamin Moore “mink”) and flanked the enormous windows with an inexpensive pleated, pink, polyester “silk” taffeta, with a chocolate velvet trim one inch off the leader edge. A beautiful upholstered headboard in a neutral color, inexpensive chandeliers from IKEA ($39/each) and some accent tables completed the look.

Stage Three: Completion

It also allowed me to give her a small pantry opposite her kitchen, and in New York where space is at such a premium, that was something that she really needed.

There’s a beautiful chandelier in that hallway from IKEA as well ($7) that throws a starburst of prisms across the ceiling, and a chocolate brown velvet swag for those moments when she wants the room to become what she now affectionately calls “her man cave”…

Last 5 posts by Tom Zemon

• Fancy House for Little Critter - September 12th, 2010
• What to do with a small bathroom space - August 1st, 2009

Author: Tom Zemon

Fresh from hosting TLC’s - BROKEN HOMES and his role as the designer on HGTV's hit series MY FIRST PLACE, Tom returns to his own Manhattan based design company where the focus is on working with clients to fully realize and achieve their own personal style. Having received his formal training at Parsons School of Design, Tom apprenticed with several well known designers before starting his own company. As for his work philosophy: "It's about understanding the client so that the environment created is a space where they can exist in their most human state - and finding a way to translate that unique, individual truth through color, texture, scale and light".

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