Posts in Interior Design
Kykuit, The Rockefeller’s Grand American Family Home

Set at the highest point in Westchester Country, Kykuit, home to four generations of Rockefellers, can’t be seen from the road. Its grandeur reveals itself slowly. Visitors are shuttled up a long hill from a remote parking lot and at first glance, the house, named after the Dutch word for look out, appears much smaller than its 40 rooms. It’s the grounds with their glorious views and large scale sculpture that first alert one to the specialness of this place.

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Building an Old House from Scratch

The sour smell of burning tar paper blanketed the air of our small town. We were in the process of replacing the roof before our move. The shingles were still in the home’s barn, but the recently nailed down tar paper was ablaze. It would be almost 2 years before those shingles were installed. We lost the house to both water and fire damage…

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This Wallpaper Collection Will Convert Wallpaper Haters

Everyone loves praise. I am no exception. Thank you to the many folks who messaged me or commented on my Instagram about their delight at my wallpaper choice and the transformation of my foyer and hallway. Repeatedly I heard that they don’t usually “do” wallpaper but the pattern I chose made them reconsider. I installed Pure Pimpernel from Zoffany’s Pure Morris Collection (available from Morris & Co. in the UK) after testing countless wallpaper samples and posting numerous inspiration rooms on Instagram…

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Garden Rooms, Then and Now

Since many of us are trying to harness nature’s restorative powers in our homes during this seemingly endless winter, I thought it would be fun to take a look at the garden room. Plant parents: all of those green babies need a space of their own.

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Interior DesignLynn Byrne
5 Favorites from KBIS

Vegas baby Vegas! Last month I traveled to Nevada as an Influencer with the Designhounds to attend the Kitchen & Bath Industry Show (KBIS), North America’s largest trade show dedicated to all aspects of kitchen and bath design. I loved seeing my old friends and fabulous new products.

Settle in for my 5 favorites.

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Interior DesignLynn Byrne
At Home at Penpont in Brecon, Wales

Imagine if your family owned a house and estate since 1666. It has survived many twists and turns, with colorful forefathers. One descendant gave birth to 4 sets of twins. A recent, rather spiteful, ancestor auctioned off most of the historic contents after a family spat. Not long after that sale, you find that you own the 2000 acre pile.  Whatever are you going to do with it!?!?  You don’t want to be the one to blow it……

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Interior DesignLynn Byrne
Taliesen West: How Frank Lloyd Wright Really Lived There

Recently, I visited Taliesen West, Frank Lloyd Wright’s winter home and architecture school in the desert outside of Scottsdale, Arizona. Our tour guide reveled in recounting the intimate details of Wright’s personal life in his winter retreat and I can’t wait to share them with you. Plenty is written elsewhere about his architectural theories. Let’s get to the fun stuff.

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Nové Město nad Metují: The Czech Chateau You Have Never Seen that Is a Design Lover’s Dream

From the outside, the chateau in the small Czech town of Nové Město nad Metují is your standard issue medieval pile. It was built in 1501 as a Gothic style fort and the façade shows it.

The approach is nice. To visit, you meander through a charming garden guarded by 22 dwarves and cross a covered bridge straight out of Grimms’ Fairy Tales.  But curb appeal is not the chateau’s strong point.

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