Design Happens

One of our favorite female designers, Genevieve Gorder, continues to share her own unique style on Dear Genevieve and will also return as a judge on the fifth season of Design Star, premiering June 20th. We had the chance recently to find out a little bit more about her.

Which female designers influenced you?

There are so many designers that influence me since design is constantly evolving. Recently I have been diving back into Dorothy Draper’s work. She was such a pioneer and what she was able to achieve as a woman in the 1920s is inspirational. Her color palettes and dramatic play on pattern and scale are still relevant in modern day interiors. She knew how powerful design was as a tool for expression and communication, and she didn’t just stop at residential and commercial interior design. Rather, she brought her passion for design to everything she could from cosmetic packaging design all the way to designing the interiors of jet planes and automobiles.

What’s the essential home accessory you use in your designs?

Textiles are one of the most important home accessory pieces. What a simple pillow, Roman shade or rug can do in a room is truly remarkable. The texture that fabric, rugs and textiles bring into a space is so important since they affect the sound of a room, the touch of the room and the visual beauty. Pattern is important to help break up the landscape of color and surface area in a space and the best way to play with that is through textiles.

What are your top three favorite places to shop for the home?

I love finding pieces for the homes I design in unexpected places. My absolute favorite place to shop is in architectural salvage yards. It is amazing what you can find and what character pieces have been around for years and years can bring to your home. I love vintage doors, mantels and anything mercury glass to name a few of the key items I look out for on my shopping ventures. I also love to shop at vintage flea markets. There are some amazing ones in my neighborhood in NYC, and I have found some true treasures. I am always on the look out for beautiful vintage glass pendant lighting, old mirrors and frames for my client’s family photographs. There is something about a lovely worn-in frame that makes a family photo feel that much more special. My third favorite place would have to be fabric stores. I absolutely adore scouring through bolts of fabric to find the perfect pattern that ties the whole room in together and adds the icing on the cake.

What’s the best design advice you’ve ever received?

The best design advice I have ever received came from my mother. I learned so much about design and home renovation from her. She instilled my lust for life early and completely fueled my love of traveling the world and incorporating nature into all my designs. She always taught me that design should feel comfortable and lived in, and it’s a principle I have clung to to this very day. I design rooms for my clients that they are a part of, rooms they will want to live and grow in comfortably for years.

The master bedroom is a mix of masculine and feminine design. Watch the makeover (episode 308) when it premieres this May.

What room did you most enjoyed designing? Why do you love it?

I truly love every space I design and each space has its own unique story both from my end and from my clients’ end. One design that will be coming up in season three of Dear Genevieve is a bedroom in West Orange, N.J. I love it because it is such a balance of masculine and feminine. It really blended a refined classic feel with urban eclectic undertones and spoke volumes of both of my homeowners characters.