Kips Bay With Cause - Floor Three!

We're deep into Kips Bay today, halfway up six floors of the spectacular 44th showhouse. We're working floor by floor, highlighting the techniques, ingenuities, transfixing design details, compositions, and created client-stories that continue to take me by surprise.

If you're just joining us on floor three and like what you see, you'll love backtracking here:

Floor One of The 44th and BEST Kips Bay Show House

Kips Bay - Floor Two: Get the Effect

Floor Three:

When DKDA started with this room, they didn't have much to work with. What was a barely even finished white box of a space, they completely transformed into an amazing library. A Kips Bay representative shared that DKDA essentially built new walls, offset 36" from the room's rim in order to create deep alcoves for sandblasted pine bookcases and architectural casework around the exterior windows of the room that created a sort of interior light shelf and academic ambience. The walls were visually soft and tactile, finished in Velours Olympia velvet wall fabric from Clarence House.

As I stood in the middle of the room, slowly taking it all in, the Kips Bay fellow noted that perhaps the most expensive item in the showhouse was in this room.

"The artwork?" I inquired. "It's value is estimated somewhere between $2-$3M. It's a William De Kooning on loan from a local gallery."

Opposite the artwork (not shown) the fireplace was accented by a floor to ceiling surround of undulating pine with decorative painting by Osmundo Studio and ribbons reminiscent of molten gold, a lovely room to play a game, jot notes, and admire a collection of objects of both personal and in this case, exceedingly great monetary value.

David Kleinberg Design Associates - The LibraryVictoria Hagan Interiors - An American Dream | Custom Draperies by Susan Chasten with integrated LED lighting

A few intangibles about the Kips Bay Showhouse that without augmented reality or digital scent (olfactory) technology can only be expressed and not virtually experienced; maybe next time I'll Periscope my visit. This Victoria Hagan room was one of a few that incorporated fresh flowers, fragrances, and music to evoke all the senses in an otherwise static and keenly temporary showhouse. Peonies by David Monn paired with Editions de Parfums Frederic Malle were a subtle but entrancing strategy for captivating admirers. Music by American trumpeter and bandleader, Harry James, was discreet yet quietly rapturous.

Perhaps due to the overall magnitude of the $49.5M 10,000sf show house, there were few operable components (saving Clive Christian's sliding cocktail cabinet) in an age where small spaces, a distinctive characteristic of New York City living, has translated into flexible, dynamic design solutions. Considering the tension of impermanence, scale, and opulence the designers who were selected to transform The Carlton House accomplished the task with minimal time and only the front door to delicately move furniture, artwork, and objects of desire through so convincingly.

Victoria Hagan Interiors - An American Dream

Victoria Hagan's "American Dream" crystallized 25 years ago, when she was first invited to participate in Kips Bay's 19th Showhouse. Her luxe Grand Salon was an ode to the path of her work as one making dreams come true. Hagan states in reference to the Showhouse that catapulted her carrer in 1991, “[I] could never have imagined the incredible journey my life would take after that small attic space [I designed] was published so majestically in The New York Times.“ In color, form, light and art, Hagan electrifies that optimistic American sensibility tracing back to that first dream in blue and white striped custom carpet by Crosby Street Studios and a red lacquer fireplace reflecting the DREAM photograph she mounted and backlit, an Instagram photo she took that inspired the direction for the space.

Sawyer | Berson Architecture, Landscape & Interiors - Petit Salon + Terrace | Paintings - The Martyrdom of Saint Bartholomew and Saint Stephen Taken to His Martyrdom

Deep green with blue undertones was such a luxurious backdrop for this Sawyer | Berson front room. A statement Durite terrazzo floor punctuated by a brassy fringed armless sofa in J&T Upholstery set the stage for the cross-disciplinary styled lounge. A custom brass panel reinterprets the originally gilded framed 17th century paintings by Italian artist Andrea Vaccaro with 21st century relevance. Framing on panel in this manner, the New York Times suggests, is "perhaps the house’s best decorating tip." (Kips Bay Offers a Colorful Answer to Decor Sameness, Penelope Green, May 11, 2016, nytimes.com) A Sputnik-style chandelier by Achille Salvagni Atelier and indirect cove lighting finish the space off with a romance and glow.