This 1901 Park Slope Townhouse Has Finally Learned How to Entertain – Here's How Ariel Okin Brought It to Life With Color, Pattern, and Purpose

At first glance, this 1901 Park Slope townhouse appears to have it all: soaring proportions, original stained glass, detailed moldings, and the kind of character Brooklyn buyers dream about.

But when designer Ariel Okin first stepped inside, she found a house design that, despite its beautiful bones, wasn't quite living up to its potential. As she puts it, many of the rooms felt like 'empty white boxes waiting to be given a point of view.'

Rich aubergines, moss greens, and sunshine-yellow lacquer brought instant character, while clever zoning, multifunctional rooms, and layered patterns transformed the brownstone's long footprint into a home designed for real life. The result is a house that now unfolds with what Ariel calls an 'elegant rhythm'.

Before introducing a single new color or fabric, Ariel's first priority was recognizing what was already there. The townhouse boasted the kind of enviable details that have become increasingly rare (thanks to them being ripped out), even in Brooklyn's historic brownstones.

'We were blessed to inherit original detailing in this home that just blew my mind the moment I saw it,' says Ariel. 'The beautiful stained glass windows in the front and back of the house, in the formal living room and kitchen, are some of my very favorite details, as well as the gorgeous front door and pocket doors that separate the dining area from the family room and kitchen. The incredible molding details are exquisite as well.'

Rather than compete with those historic features, Ariel set out to celebrate them. 'It was incredibly important to me to preserve those incredible details, wherever we found them,' she says.

That respect for the home's past became the foundation for everything that followed, while still trying to make the space work harder for family life.

The owners, a young family with one child and another on the way at the time (and a third since arrived), had spent several months settling into the house before calling Ariel. The home had already been restored by a contractor, so while the bones were intact, the interiors weren't supporting the way they wanted to live.

Entertaining felt awkward, family spaces were underutilized, and there was little of the personality they had envisioned for their forever home.

'They were craving jewel tones and saturated hues to bring energy and liveliness into their new home, and they wanted the space to truly reflect the full, modern life of their growing family,' Ariel explains.

'I love when clients aren't afraid of color, and these clients really were open to pushing the envelope, which was so exciting for us,' says Ariel. 'The directive was to inject color, and lots of it, so we went hunting for the most interesting hues we could find.'

The most dramatic expression of that can be found in the front of the home. 'The formal living space ended up in deep plums reminiscent of summer eggplant, paired with a patinated verdigris that gave it depth and a sense of age,' Ariel explains.

'The unifying idea was always to find characterful color and pair it with materials that have soul, so the result reads as art-forward and saturated, without feeling too high contrast or visually busy – a calm home was also important to the clients, in addition to it being a colorful home,' she explains.

Creating a colorful home wasn't the only challenge Ariel had to face, however.

For all their charm, historic brownstones come with a long, narrow floor plan that can feel more like a corridor without careful planning. 'Brownstone layouts often run as one long galley-like rectangle from the front of the house to the back, and that was true here,' Ariel explains. 'It's a tricky configuration – the formal living area can bleed into the dining room, kitchen, and family room without any clear delineation – so one of the first things we did was give that long axis some much-needed structure.'

'We used rugs and our furniture plans as markers to designate zones, allowing for front-of-house formal entertaining spaces and everyday high-traffic spaces toward the back, without adding walls or letting any one area shout over the others,' she adds.

More importantly, it has completely changed how the family uses the house.

'When they first moved in, they weren't really entertaining, because the formal living room felt cut off from the dining area, and the kitchen didn't offer anywhere casual to hang out or watch TV,' says Ariel. 'There was no playroom for the kids and no guest room for grandparents or friends to have a proper stay.'

'So we designed accordingly,' she adds. 'In the city, rooms have to flex between formal entertaining and everyday family life. That dual identity – sophisticated yet still functional and practical for everyday life, is baked into city living.'

The kitchen, where you'll note the palette pulled from the original stained glass windows, received some of the most transformative updates.

To make the space work harder for a growing family, Ariel boarded up a nonworking fireplace to create room for a built-in banquette, complete with dining table and chairs.

'We extended the island for more seating and prep space. The family of five now enjoys pancake breakfasts in a true eat-in kitchen, which makes me so happy,' she explains.

Nearby, the home bar has become one of the home's standout features.

'Tucked nearby is the wet bar in the family area, dressed in that orangey-yellow, egg-yolk lacquer paired with a honed, veined Italian marble – a real focal moment that allows for seamless entertaining, whether it's serving French pressed coffee at a casual brunch or martinis for an evening of grown-up hosting,' Ariel adds.

More than just an eye-catching decorative moment, it's also been designed to support the way the family hosts.

While the lower levels of the townhouse are designed for gathering, the upper floors offer a place to retreat.

That sense of quiet begins in the primary suite, which Ariel envisioned as a genuine escape from the demands of everyday life. 'The primary bedroom is designed as a real retreat – a place these two busy working parents can actually decompress at the end of the day.'

'Overall, I didn't want the home to feel busy or scream maximalist, and I think we achieved a nice balance of cozy and neutral – choosing solids like a mink hued velvet mohair for the sofa in the living room, or a solid marigold for the primary bedroom settee – and then bouncing patterns off of those, rather than everything being smattered in pattern down to the very last square inch,' she adds of the layered scheme.

One of the home's most unexpected luxuries lies just beyond the primary bedroom suite, where Ariel carved out what she describes as a 'dream patio' – 'an outdoor extension of the home that's become one of their favorite places to gather.'

Surrounded by greenery, the terrace feels remarkably removed from the pace of city life, while comfortable seating encourages slow moments. It's a rare feeling in Brooklyn, where outdoor space is coveted enough, let alone one with such a serene outlook.

'Aesthetically, the saturated palette and willingness to layer color and pattern feels like a love letter to the city's appetite for personality and creativity, and the patio we added at the back of the house is its own little Brooklyn fantasy: a dream outdoor moment looking right at an ancient tree in their backyard,' she adds.

The bathrooms strike a similar balance between character and calm. Rather than introducing something sleek and overly contemporary, Ariel looked for materials that would feel as though they had always belonged within the home.

'Upstairs, the bathrooms are clad in sage green Zellige tiles with their worn, lived-in patina,' Ariel adds. Wrapped in warm neutral tones, the tiles are joined by a host of timeless companions: grained wood cabinetry, cool marble checkerboard floors, traditional fittings, and delicate botanical artwork that feels perfectly at home in the historic setting.

The children's rooms continue the home's celebration of color and pattern, proving that family-friendly design needn't mean sacrificing personality.

'This house is built for living – two working parents, three kids under the age of five, friends and grandparents coming through – and we wanted it to reflect the joy and ebullience of a full, busy life,' she explains.

'Pattern can make rooms feel alive, and it's also forgiving; there's a practicality to layered prints and textures when small kids are involved (easier to hide the fingerprints!),' Ariel adds.

'On the garden level, the children's playroom welcomes at the base of the stairs, ready to transform into a guest bedroom whenever they need it,' Ariel adds of the further kid-friendly spaces.

Rather than dedicating valuable square footage to a room used only occasionally, she devised a solution that allows the space to seamlessly shift between two roles. 'The flex play space got a great pull-out sofa so that it can flip into a guest bedroom on a whim – the everyday version is a kid-friendly hangout, but it transitions into a proper room for visitors without missing a beat.'

'The rooms are multifunctional and personal, there to support them as they grow and thrive in their dynamic new space.'

Elsewhere, Ariel looked for opportunities to reclaim overlooked areas. Near the kitchen, an awkward corner that had previously sat empty was transformed into a cozy family room.

'We crafted a custom sofa to fit into a little nook tucked caddy-corner to the kitchen, giving our clients a proper family room where there had just been empty space,' she explains.

Similarly, back on the garden level, Ariel continues the theme of flexibility. Here, a 'sexy, deep navy lacquered bar with antiqued glass mirror' anchors an additional entertaining zone, complete with a card table and a snug room designed for movie nights.

In many ways, the success of this renovation has less to do with the jewel-tones, the patterns, or the beautifully preserved historic details. Instead, it lies in how the house now supports the family that calls it home.

'The best compliment we got when this project was finished was that the renovation helped our clients actually use the house the way they wanted to,' Ariel notes. 'The thought of throwing a dinner party used to feel daunting to our client, and now there's an elegant rhythm from cocktails in the living room to dinner at the table.'

'It is the kind of home you walk into and find a beautiful surprise as it unfurls while you walk through the space,' she continues. 'I hope it feels like the place that holds every chapter of their life, from pancake breakfasts in the eat-in kitchen to summer evenings out on the patio.'

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