Timeless By Design | Nina Farmer
Intro: Welcome to the one and only Interior Design Book Podcast, Decorating by the Book, hosted by Suzy Chase from her dining room table in New York City. Join Suzy for conversations about the latest and greatest interior design books with the authors who wrote them.
Nina Farmer: Thank you so much for having me on. I'm Nina Farmer, and I just came out with my first book called Timeless by Design.
Suzy Chase: Okay, I first want to say a huge congratulations to you for this gorgeous debut book. This is our guidebook on mixing furniture and accessories from different periods. So when you started school at The New York School of Interior Design, you knew nothing about design. You actually had a pre-med background. What prompted you to leave pre-med to pivot to interiors? I thought that was so interesting.
Nina Farmer: Yeah. So I had a very sort of circuitous path to my design career that I currently have. But I had always loved architecture and interior design as a child. My parents were also very involved in art and architecture. They had designed and built our first home. They had designed and built spec homes. We were always going to all of the show houses. I went to every Kips Bay. So it was always this sort of side passion that they had and passed down to me. But I never gave myself permission to think of it as a career choice because it just didn't seem like an academic enough know, when you're in the sciences. My Dad's a physician. I ended up marrying a know, I think you sort of feel like there's this academic path to follow. And so I ended up in public health school here in Boston, and I just wasn't sure where I was going with it, what I was going to do with it. So I took a leap of absence and enrolled in an intensive architecture program at Harvard that they offered. And as soon as I did that, I knew A, it is very academic, but that I needed to make the, you know, it wasn't about at that point what the classes really were. It was like, what was the job going to be? Which I was so sort of short sighted in my previous thinking. And so I knew I loved it, fell in love immediately. I was sort of in between going to architecture school and interior design school, but I just had this passion for the furnishings, the mix of things, and I knew that the interior side is what I wanted to focus on. So I ended up enrolling in New York School of Interior Design right away and never looked back after that.
Suzy Chase: So not knowing anything about the job, one big thing you never thought of but learned when you were at the New York School of Interior Design was the impact you have on the way families live and interact in their home. Do you have a memory that stands out of how your work made a difference in someone's life.
Nina Farmer: Starting out a lot of my clients were my friends and as I've gone on, friends have turned into clients and clients into friends and the whole world's sort of gotten mixed up in that way for me. But I've been really fortunate to attend a lot of parties and holidays at their houses. So I've been able to see people interacting and living in the spaces that I design quite frequently. My first big party was a New Year's party that a client threw at her house in Brookline and we had designed the space to be used for parties purposely. This was a client that knew they wanted to entertain. And so there was sort of like this very public part of the house and then a private part of the house that was purposely thought through. And it was my first time really experiencing how people might feel in one part greeted in a certain way rather than the way you would typically come to the house. And I just love seeing it all come to fruition. You don't really get to do that if you don't know your clients personally.
Suzy Chase: When your husband began his medical fellowship in Boston, you settled Intro, an 1850s townhouse in Beacon Hill, and the redesign of your new home became your very first project that served as your learning lab and later as a calling card as you set up your business. I'd love for you to talk a little bit about that.
Nina Farmer: Yeah, it was really great. I had moved up from New York and purchased the brownstone that we're in and knew that it had to be renovated and I had never lived in a historic home before. My parents, as I mentioned, built their home from scratch. And so I had this ability to really understand historic architecture in a much more tangible way and really deal with twelve foot ceilings and plaster moldings and original fireplaces and the layout of historic homes and understand the size and the scale and the proportions and what that was about. And so it was really this gift that I didn't know that I was getting when I purchased the apartment. And it subsequently led to a few other historic homes as my next job. And that really became a calling card for me. And I didn't suspect when I moved here that that was going to be such a big part of my career and have loved that part and never looked back and have thought, okay, this was sort of a Kismet moment, having that being my first job here and really my first experience with historic architecture.
Suzy Chase: In the forward. Mitch Owens talked about how he met you on a trip in Morocco. I'd love to hear about that.
Nina Farmer: Yeah, this was a trip that I went on with Architectural Digest and Indagare and it was the first time that they had paired up and they were going to Marrakesh. And so I had immediately I traveled with Indagare and I knew what amazing trips they put on. So I was sort of all in on the experience and it was just magical. Doesn't really even begin to explain it. We had access to houses and historic homes that were there that weren't open to the public. I got to go to Claudio Bravo's home, who my parents actually had a piece of his artwork. So I was very familiar with his work and just know all the behind the scenes. We had lunch in Yves Saint Laurent's garden and toward his home that's not open to the public. I mean, it just went on and on how amazing it was. But I had the opportunity to of course, Mitch Owens was there representing Architectural Digest, and he had lived there as well for a couple of years, so really was familiar with Marrakesh and the customs and the way people lived. And it was just so interesting to see it through that viewpoint. I had been by myself, and I just experienced it in a very different it was it was great and completely hit it off with Mitch Owens. And of course, he knows everything about historic architecture and is just a really wonderful person to have met on that tour.
Suzy Chase: I love this bit Mitch wrote about you. He wrote, “her homes for clients as well as for herself are collected environments where elegance meets bohemia, where smooth meets nubby, and most of all, where there meets here and then meets now.” What a glorious statement that seems to be all encompassing of your approach to design.
Nina Farmer: He really has a way with words. I will definitely give it to him. And he hit the nail on the head. I mean, all of that is so true and is so really where I wanted to go with my design. I see things through a much more visual lens. And so sitting down to understand what this book was going to be about and really diving into my projects as a whole and saying, what is the tie? What's the thread? What was the message? Was an interesting exercise. And I think he really summed it up so well in his forward.
Suzy Chase: I love the way you so effortlessly mix furniture and accessories from different periods. How can we do that in our homes? Do you have one hot tip for us?
Nina Farmer: Yeah, well, thank you for the nice, kind comment. I appreciate that. Yeah. A big piece of my work does center around getting the right mix of old and new in a project, and I think it's especially true when it comes to incorporating decorative lighting. I think that's an area that a lot of people can start with to start to get that mix that makes projects so much more interesting. So I would look towards decorative lighting. I particularly like Art Deco through mid-century periods. I'm a big fan of 1stDibs. So I'll just spend hours and hours kind of cruising on there. But there's Chairish, there's InCollect lots of online sites where you can kind of go and hone your skills and put keyword searches in. But I think starting with lighting is one of the easier areas to kind of get that mix in and then once mastered that, you can go into furniture and pulling that together. But decorative lighting is a really great one to start with, do you think.
Suzy Chase: Because it warms up the room?
Nina Farmer: I think because it becomes part of the architectural envelope too, as opposed to the furniture, people generally view as, okay, that's furnishings, but what's on the walls and the ceilings really becomes part of the architecture. And generally speaking, people, if you're living in a new construction home or the home doesn't have a lot of character, it's really probably in the envelope of the space that you're sensing that. And so if you can make that visual change, there's more interesting materials and lines and things that you're not seeing in today's lighting I think you can find when looking back to historic lighting and it really helps to change the mood of the space quite a lot.
Suzy Chase: So what you just touched on a little bit was how your interiors remain contextually rooted in the time and place in which they were built. Now, is that a principle that was sort of baked in from growing up in a classic town like Boston?
Nina Farmer: You know, living and working in Boston has really helped me understand the concept of designing for present day. I think in older homes you find a lot of superfluous rooms or rooms not designed for the way people use them today. The common one I'll come across is a double parlor space and people usually don't want formal rooms anymore and then double spaces tend to be hard. And so I think the trick is finding interesting ways to reinterpret them to be more useful today. So that can be anything. In one of the brownstones I worked on in Beacon Hill, we actually moved the kitchen and the dining space to the double parlor space that was right there in the front. You know, my clients were saying, I don't want to carry my groceries up to the second floor or down to the bottom floor to then have to kind of move back everything back up and down. And so I think looking at the way people are living and using their house is so key to making them feel comfortable and living in a historic home.
Suzy Chase: So when you walked into the foyer, on the left was the kitchen?
Nina Farmer: So when you walk in now, there's stairs that are straight ahead of you that go up through the whole brownstone and then there's the kitchen to the left, and behind the kitchen is we sort of had room for a seating area and then a eating kitchen area. So you can kind of experience all that on one level, which is really where a family tends to you know, there's so much use on that one floor and that particular home. The kitchen was on the lower garden level, which was common for Beacon Hill Townhouses because there would be staff and they wouldn't be living in their kitchen so much. So that really changed the whole layout of how the house was experienced just by moving that and taking out it had two double fireplaces at the time. We kept the one in the sitting area and removed the one in the kitchen area to make it all work out. But I think it's understanding the play or the balance between how you live and making sure the rooms are going to be sort of situated well for that experience and not being too scared of really just saying, okay, I will or I won't use this formal space. Being sort of honest with yourself about that and then kind of converting it as you see fit. And you'll really live because that's the way you want to live in your house. You don't want to not experience multiple rooms just because you want to keep them as they are supposed to be.
Suzy Chase: So let's chat about the section in the book called Threads of Inspiration, and there are two subsections called Celebrating the Past, Exploring the World, and Living in the Present. Can you tell me a little bit about this?
Nina Farmer: Sure. Yeah. When I was sort of conceptualizing the idea of the book and what drove my design vision, I knew I wanted to explore definitely the topic of history and certainly travel as we just touched upon, and, of course, how we live today. So I thought those things, once you kind of dial into those, will tell so much about the houses. But I really thought, okay, diving into the thought process and what's rooted behind these ideas is going to be so helpful, and then explaining, okay, and here's what's show the projects next. So I think everyone has their process and what drives them. But for me, certainly exploring the world, being traveling, and gaining design ideas, but also really understanding how people live in different cultures has been just so huge in everything to me, from color to pattern to combining different materials. It's really been such a help. And I find when I talk to other designers, they too generally think that travel is one of the biggest influences for them.
Suzy Chase: And then we come to the houses section of the book. My favorite is the 1940s home in Concord, Massachusetts, with the ivy-covered stucco facade. It's eight over eight windows, brick details, and patinaed copper portico. To me, it's the perfect, timeless home. Now, with a project like this, do your first impressions come fast and furiously or does it take time to nail down where you want the design to go?
Nina Farmer: This house in particular is in a very historic part of Concord. It's right actually up the street from the Alcott house. And so immediately there's some thoughts that get conjured up. But when I walked into this house, I just sort of had these visions to start. And I think when the architecture speaks loudly to you or the context of the house, I think it's easier to start drawing design ideas faster. Sometimes that doesn't come to you. Or some of our houses are new construction and you have to sort of think about things in a little bit of a different light. But in this particular house, I walked into the room in the house that's sort of a den study room. And I immediately thought of the embossed leather walls at the Veronese Room in Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. And I sort of turned to my client and I said, I have an idea for this room. I don't know if you've been to the Gardener Museum. And the client looked at me with this funny look and said, well, actually, I happen to love it. I'm on the board there, and it's my favorite place in Boston. And I had no taste. And so it really felt so like all the stars were aligning. This was where this room had to go. And so we designed this paper that it wasn't leather embossed. We did it on gesso and with oil paint, but we cut it up into rectangles and installed it in overlapping rectangles with a little bit of the same sort of inspiration and idea of how she installed her panels. So you kind of get this artistic view out of it. It wasn't hung like regular wallpaper was hung. And it's just my clients tell me it's their favorite room in the house. And before, it was sort of this dark, a little bit cave like, not that inspiring to sit in or do anything in. And they spend so much time now in the space. So it was such a great moment that really came to me right away. But that doesn't always happen. Sometimes you need to sit with it, and then the ideas start to flow.
Suzy Chase: In the book, you talk about how adding older art provides many of the same benefits as designing with antiques and historic architectural detail. That's such an interesting concept, and I'm curious to hear about that.
Nina Farmer: Yeah, as I mentioned, I was really fortunate enough to have parents that grew up taking me to galleries and showing me the whole world of art. My parents were really drawn to more contemporary pieces, but my grandparents collected Expressionist art, and I was always drawn to their art and actually lucky enough to inherit some of the pieces after they passed. But there was a lot that drew me to them. But particularly, I think the color palettes very closely parallel my work and what I'm drawn to. So I think if people love sort of the same palettes that you kind of see in my work, which tend to be a little bit maybe moody with some pops of interesting colors that skew things a little bit, or interesting color combinations. I think you can get a lot of that from period art rather than contemporary pieces. In my opinion. They both are great, and we use a lot of both for client projects. I just particularly love the idea of looking to some older art as well.
Suzy Chase: Now to my segment called Home, where I ask you to describe one memory of your childhood home and please start by telling us where it was located.
Nina Farmer: Interesting. So I'm going to do a little hybrid of that and maybe tell you, too, because, you know, as I mentioned, I grew up in Westport, Connecticut, in a home that my parents designed and built from scratch when I was three. So my mother likes to remind me that I learned construction by osmosis while on her hip. She was there every day kind of managing the process. And so they built a contemporary home that I loved and loved growing up in. But when I look to my design influence, I think my first memory happens to be a family home that we had in Finland. My Mom is Finnish, and we'd go there every summer. And it was a little red lake house that was sort of perfectly situated there's, a very rocky, kind of almost main like, coast there. And it was situated right by the water's edge. And it was just very simple but perfect, not overly fussy, open, shelving kind of white interior, and it was down a dirt road. There was actually an outhouse. So that was clearly burned into my memory. And a little candy truck would come down the lane every day to sell us candy. And it just felt like this simple, sweet, just perfect way to live. And so when I design a lot of second homes, I draw on that feeling, that experience that gave me. And so it wasn't necessarily my everyday house, but sometimes I think those vacation houses or those even just places that you visit can feel so memorable because they take you out of your everyday experience. So that one was big for me.
Suzy Chase: Where can we find you on the web and social media?
Nina Farmer: So you can find me on the web at Nina Farmer Interiors and social media. I'm on Instagram at. Also Nina Farmer Interiors.
Suzy Chase: So to close out, I came upon your blog that you started way back in 2011. And your first post went like this “ I've been reluctant to embrace the current age of social media. So when I recently saw this quote by Ellsworth Kelly, I found it very apropos for my first post. I am nourished by the past, I am questioning the present, and I am stepping into the future.” I mean, this is just perfect. Nina, I cannot thank you enough for coming on decorating by the Book Podcast. This was so much fun.
Nina Farmer: Oh, thank you so much for having me. I had so much fun.
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