From the grand, newly-minted displays in Dallas to the gilded, sun-soaked abodes of Palm Beach to the bustling streets of New York City where it all began half a century ago, you never quite know what you’re walking into at a Kips Bay Decorator Show House – only that it will be fabulous.
This year, the philanthropic design endeavor celebrated its 50th anniversary inside a sprawling eight-bedroom townhouse at 20 West 12th Street in Manhattan’s storied, once artist-fueled Greenwich Village. The lineup of 21 illustrious designers – including Corey Damen Jenkins, Alexa Hampton, and long-time Kips Bay legacy Christopher Peacock, returning for his ninth kitchen – did not disappoint.
As ever, the magic wasn’t in the already grand architecture but in the details these creative minds layered in: the unexpected color pairing, the cushion that suddenly made sense of a sofa, the humble drawer pull you’d never noticed but now can’t forget.
Six floors of prime urban real estate, seven standout interior design trends – here’s everything that caught my eye as I made my rounds, and everything I’m eager to bring home.
1. Pink and Green
With Wicked back in the cultural conversation – the sequel, Wicked: For Good, en route – it’s hardly shocking that pink and green are back in conversation. Whether intentional or gleaned from the cultural ether, this cheerful color combination made multiple cameos across this year’s show house.
Ben Pentreath’s drawing room, inspired entirely by H. M. The King’s Highgrove collection for Sanderson, felt like a love letter to the garden itself, featuring leafy greens, climbing florals, and the kind of painterly charm that makes you wish for an English conservatory. A table lamp (mossy base, pink shade) echoed the theme in dialogue.
James Huniford took the cue in a subtler direction. His living room, wrapped floor to ceiling in cork, caught a faint pink cast against muted moss walls and patterned carpet, punctuated by slightly more saturated artwork – giving cork, of all things, a warm, luminous depth we rarely associate with the material.
Cosmo and Wanda, Elphaba and Glinda – pick your duo, but I have a watermelon crush on this color combo, especially paired with Pooky’s sinuous ceramic base.
2. Haute Hardware
Life’s too short for boring knobs. Why not hang your coat from the neck of an ornately detailed brass bird in Olivia Williams Studio’s ‘Apartment Ryu’, or pull the twisting black-and-ivory handles of a steamer-trunk-inspired cabinet in Leyden Lewis Design Studio’s 'Salon Analogue'?
Unique hardware – the knobs, pulls, and hooks that so often go unnoticed – proved to be the smallest designer flex with the biggest impact. It’s an easy upgrade that travels from entryway to kitchen to closet door, and one I, for one, plan to copy in my own (much smaller) NYC apartment.
Cheating only slightly since I already own Anthropologie’s Lark hardware, but it deserves a nod for its hotel-lobby polish and jewelry-like swing.
3. Spherical Pillows
Rectangles and squares suddenly felt passé somewhere between floors three and six of the Greenwich Village townhouse. Everywhere I turned, sofas and built-ins were punctuated with perfectly round, little orb pillows that made even the most traditional corners feel avant-garde.
Some appeared clustered in sculptural stacks (sphere on sphere), others nestled among more standard cushion fare. The most striking vignette? The arched book-nook seating flanking the living room doorway by Denver and SoCal-based designer Andrea Schumacher, where the spheres softened its dramatic lines.
A walk in the park? According to Sarah Sherman Samuel, the garden’s the more scenic route. This richly detailed round cushion channels both – available in blush or blue.
4. Ample Bathroom Art
The era of a single ironic art print hanging over the toilet is officially over. If you’re not treating your bathroom like a miniature gallery by embracing bathroom art ideas, you’re wasting prime real estate – and the perfect opportunity to humble-brag about your taste to anyone fortunate enough to take the throne.
The standout example came from Indianapolis-based designer Tiffany Skilling, whose jewel-box bath paired bold, bulbous sconces and an ornate vanity mirror with frame upon frame of botanical art – lush, small-scale counterpoints to the equally botanical wallpaper enveloping the room. Meanwhile, a lone portrait of a lady presided over the porcelain with her watchful eye.
Bathroom art is a delicate dance – too serious reads oddly cerebral, while too cheeky is done to death. This two-part, wide-eyed feline painting strikes a nice balance set in an opulent gold frame.
5. Experimental Andirons
We’ve spent years obsessing over everything around the fireplace – the marble mantel, the florid screen, the shiny set of tools just off to the side – but this year, designers turned their attention to the logs themselves. Because if your firewood isn’t lounging in something sculptural, it’s already behind.
In Alexa Hampton’s runway-inspired, pattern-drenched bedroom, Deco-style starbursts transformed the andirons into sculpture – a celestial spin alongside the surrounding florals. Upstairs, James Huniford went in the opposite direction, opting for minimalist, sphere-topped accents that cradled bundles of wood (or, in other rooms, sticks of selenite).
The hearth is, officially, hotter than ever.
Non-working fireplace? No problem – not when your logs (or ‘logs’) are carried in something this good. Designed by Studio ANANSI, this Art Deco–inspired holder multiples its drama with curved edges and antiqued brass detailing.
6. High-Shine Furniture
If you thought chrome’s comeback had run its course, think again. Vincente Wolfe proved otherwise in the 'Peacock Room,' where sleek, geometric seating gleamed beneath the light – its mirrored finish made unexpectedly soft by pale-blue upholstery. And just upstairs, in James Huniford’s sunlit living room, a circular high-gloss table commanded attention like a sculptural, Space Age centerpiece.
But silver wasn’t the only metal in the mix. In J. Cohler Mason Design’s writing room, a Dennis Miller desk and matching chair seemed to melt into their surroundings, their legs rippling in a warm metallic tone, reading like liquid gold. Chrome may have started the conversation, but it’s the fluid, molten finishes that kept it interesting.
This retro home decor finish enjoyed a revival throughout the show house, and Orren Ellis' 'foot' table nails the organic assignment. Set it with a crystal dish of collected trinkets, an objet vase, or a well-mixed negroni (preferably all three).
7. Animal Inspo
Leopards, tigers, and… horsehair? Animal motifs have been back on the prowl, bolstered over the past couple of years by TikTok-fueled nostalgia and the rise of internet aesthetics like ‘Mob Wife’ and ‘Rockstar Girlfriend’. Naturally, they made their mark throughout the townhouse – a wild Clarence House silk-velvet tiger-print chair in the ‘Painted Passage’ by James Thomas Interiors; Scalamandré leopard-silk pillows and a matching ottoman in Pavarini Design’s home office; and perhaps the boldest move of all, a staircase by Ovadia Design Group lined with crawling cat motifs, which made each step I climbed feel more daring than the last.
But not all the animal references were metaphorical. In the ‘Salon Analogue’ by Leyden Lewis Design Studio, I spotted a horsehair object on the coffee table, which coordinated with Konekt’s whimsically named horsehair stools (‘Thing 1’ and ‘Thing 3’). The trio added a rarified feel – and a hint of humor – to their corner of the show house.
Subtlety, it seems, has been put out to pasture.
This urn-shaped vase by Philadelphia-based ceramicist Steph Trowbridge scratches an itch my inner horse girl didn’t even know she had.
On the topic of designers' du jour interests, discover the pattern pairings they simply cannot get enough of for fall.
You must confirm your public display name before commenting
Please logout and then login again, you will then be prompted to enter your display name.