A Coastal Affair

My friend Laura is celebrating her 20 year work anniversary this summer.  It is hard to believe she started LMB Communications 20 years ago because she LOOKS about 25!  Laura opened the doors to her own business when Nestle, where she worked in Communications & Public Relations, relocated to the west coast.  She decided to stay in New York and began consulting with major corporations on communications, media, PR, philanthropy and special events.  Voila, 20 years later!

As a gift to herself for hitting the 20 year mark, Laura wanted to spruce up her home office where she works 2-3 days a week.  Her keywords to me were coastal, creative and comfortable.  A space where her clients, family and friends would love to hang out.

Laura gravitates to the colors blue and orange, so we started there.  She found two ottomans from Ballard Designs in a blue/white fabric she liked.  This solidified the blue tone we would use in the room.  The ottomans also had storage for her files inside.  Great dual purpose.

We found a fabulous Dash and Albert indoor/outdoor rug (easy to clean since it would get a lot of foot traffic)  in a blue stripe and a bright orange fabric from Duralee for pillows.

A couch was needed in the office for meetings and some lounging (this one is from Pottery Barn), replacing an old storage unit under the window.

An old brown hutch in the room had a ton of storage space inside to hide office supplies, so instead of getting rid of it, we painted it white and Laura found these great knobs at Anthropologie to go with her coastal theme.  We hid the printer and many other things in the hutch to keep them out of sight!

Before

After

There was some general cleaning up to do, so we did a little “purging” and gave the room a nice, fresh coat of paint in a soft periwinkle blue.

Fun accents in the room make it personal to Laura.

Laura travels overseas quite a bit for business, so I found French (on left) and Italian (on right) vintage posters to hang on either side of her new couch to give the office a little European touch. We also converted two recessed ceiling lights to round hanging lights (above) to personalize the space and make the sitting area cozy.  The two tables on either side of the couch are from Target.

Laura LOVES Cape May, so there are reminders all around her office, including a series of beautiful black/white beach prints of Cape May that she took herself.

Leftover fabric from the couch pillows was used for a 6″ wide band on the bottom of a white cotton duck roman shade, hanging over the couch.

I love how the orange fabric in the roman shade matches the stripes on the shirt in the Italian poster!

I hope Laura is happy with all the changes we made.  She did say everyone, including Sophia the dog, seems to be hanging out in there now…  We might actually have to SHUT the doors that lead into her office from the living room!

Cheers to 20 years of success.

the wry home