How do you make a 25,000-square-foot office building with drop ceilings and dated conference rooms feel opulent, design-forward, and homey? That was the challenge for the 25 designers tapped for the fifth annual Kips Bay Decorator Show House Dallas, open now through November 13.
The Dallas Show House, located near downtown in the Turtle Creek neighborhood, is an extension of the original Kips Bay Decorator Show House that debuted on Manhattan’s Upper East Side in 1973. It featured over-the-top spaces by acclaimed interior designers, with ticket proceeds going to raise money for after-school programs for New York City children. More than fifty years and $30 million later, the organization has only two other outposts: West Palm Beach and Dallas. In other words, it’s a big moment for Texas talent (17 of the 25 designers are based in the Lone Star State). The show is also an opportunity to raise big money for local nonprofits that serve families in North Texas. This year’s recipients are Dwell with Dignity, a nonprofit that helps formerly unhoused people and families furnish their spaces, and the Crystal Charity Ball, which distributes funds to a variety of children’s charities in the Dallas area.
The show house rooms are inspired by everything from Sandro Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus painting to a men’s smoking jacket. One designer drew on a memory of her childhood Midwest home with the goal of making wood paneling, wall-to-wall carpet, and popcorn ceilings cool again. Another dug deep into the building’s past to resurrect the feeling of the Cipango Club, a swanky 1940s spot that once resided on-site. Whether you’re remodeling your own space or, like us, simply daydreaming about the possibilities, there’s no shortage of decor inspiration. Below are all the interior design trends from the show house that we can’t stop thinking about.
Personal Touches
The show house isn’t actually a home, so you might expect it to be devoid of personal effects. But, as many of the designers showcased, great design is rooted in a great story.
One designer incorporated his grandmother’s Ming chairs; another created impactful yet affordable art by framing her husband’s collection of vintage pocket squares. Sherry Hayslip of Dallas-based Sherry Hayslip Interiors hung blueprints of the original building drawn by the architect, who also happened to be her late husband. Dallasite Ashley Ross of Muse Noire Interiors created an intimate, gallery-like moment by centering two vintage theater chairs, surrounded by hanging lights, opposite one of her favorite photographs by Gordon Parks. The photo, Ross said, was a nod to her journey as a Black designer.
Indoor, Outdoor, Who Cares?
Perhaps because Texans don’t get to use their outdoor spaces as much as they’d like, designers put natural elements on full display inside. Founders of the Austin-based Henry Street Design firm installed giant brass palm trees in the tearoom, and Dallas designer Jan Showers adorned the ceiling of her lounge with life-like birds. Courtnay Tartt Elias of Houston’s Creative Tonic Design incorporated flora and fauna into the chandelier and trellis columns in the kitchen she nicknamed the Citrus Garden. (Keep your eyes peeled for the silver snail with ladybug cocktail picks in the breakfast nook and the topiaries planted in a champagne bucket.)
The show house’s terrace, reimagined by Lambert Landscape Company in Dallas, took the opposite approach, bookending fountains and native Texas plants with canopies made from custom fabrics that could double as draperies. The outdoor kitchen had a gaucho grill and an elegant—and weather-resistant—porcelain backsplash.
Unexpected Backsplashes
Speaking of backsplashes, other novel approaches included an asymmetrical, wavy backsplash in the women’s bathroom by Dallas-based Ink + Oro Creatives and a mirror backsplash, bordered by a marble trim, in Tartt Elias’s kitchen. This type of backsplash is great for smaller spaces and more affordable (a mirror can be less pricey than tile or stone), but for messier chefs worried about constant upkeep, Tartt Elias recommended an antique-style mirror to help disguise any spills or spaghetti sauce splatters.
Wallpaper Galore
If there’s a room without wallpaper in the Dallas show house, we couldn’t find it. From a Texas-sized floral print in the stairwell (selected by Loudermilk Jordan in New York City) to several large-scale murals, the show house reinforced that wall coverings are back in a big way. Look for the hand-painted designs by sponsor Gracie Studio, a 120-year-old company that adorns the homes of celebrities and presidents (a chinoiserie pattern was chosen for the primary bedroom in The White House), but don’t sleep on the more subtle patterns, either. The guest room by Dallas’s Lisa Henderson Interiors featured a print from her line called English Garden. The botanical stripes in the children’s room, by Houston’s Katie Davis Design, made me want to be a kid again.
Awe-Inspiring Ceilings
A ceiling can often be an afterthought, but here it’s treated as a fifth wall. A handful of designers covered their segments of ceiling in fabric, including the husband-and-wife duo behind French & French Interiors in Santa Fe, New Mexico. They repeated the ceiling’s stripes in a different colorway on the pillows in their whimsical drawing room. If you can peel your eyes away from the antique French desk in the Sobremesa Lounge—it was retrofitted into a bar—don’t forget to look up. The ceiling, which pays tribute to the history of jimadores in Mexico, is a showstopper. Dallasite Javier Burkle of Burkle Creative built the homage with an oxblood color palette, diamondesque wallpaper, a mid-century, modern-style medallion, brass agave leaves, and a jute-covered chandelier.
Trim on Trim on Trim
One buzzword repeated by nearly every designer? Layers. This often manifested as trim on textiles, extra millwork, or in the case of Traci Connell Interiors’ cigar lounge, both. The Dallas-based designer used three rows of molding to visually lower the ceiling and make the room feel cozier. Then she played up texture with a feathered trim on a chaise lounge.
Trish Sheats, who runs her namesake design firm out of Fort Worth, also gave a layering master class with her space: a blue and white salon. Instead of upholstering the underside of a couch in the same fabric as the sofa skirt, she juxtaposed a striped fabric with an organic, velvet top layer. The same sofa had both a braided tassel trim on the bottom and a ruffled trim along the armrest.
Plates as Art
Disguising a fridge with wood panels is nothing new, but Tartt Elias took the latest model of a Kohler fridge (with a black interior, no less) and crafted a top that resembled an antique china cabinet. Then she added lucite and brass handles and eleven charming display plates to the front. Fine china appeared in other rooms, too: Wall brackets in the guest room supported European Delft chargers, and less precious plates were mounted high above a doorway in Davis’s children’s room.
Picture Rails
Forget hanging your art on a nail; these days it’s all about the old-fashioned approach. In more than a dozen rooms, designers opted for Victorian-era picture rails and dainty chains to display paintings, photographs, and mirrors. One of the best examples was the rotunda by Dallas-based studio Swoon. The designers turned second-story windows that may have otherwise been overlooked into a focal point, with chains purchased from the hardware store and photographs they took themselves. With the chain hidden behind a curtain, the oval frames appeared to be floating in midair.
A Bar in (Almost) Every Room
Except for the children’s room and bathrooms, every space had some sort of bar. A few felt particularly fresh: In the listening room, an antique tea kettle and Japanese cups made for more of a zen zero-proof happy hour, a minimalist coffee system in the cigar lounge was installed with espresso martinis in mind, and the library held a hidden caviar bar. Dallas’s Shelby Wagner Design also turned the old cloakroom into a warm welcome station with silver cocktail shakers, smokey glassware, and a sophisticated shade of orange reminiscent of Hermés and the University of Texas (Wagner says that was unintentional—he’s a proud SMU alum).
Sustainable Solutions
Swoon anchored its space with Frank Gehry’s Wiggle Side Chair, made from scrap cardboard. Tartt Elias used fabric remnants for chord covers and modeled her lampshade slipcovers, which can be swapped out as tastes or seasons change. And several designers mentioned their love of patina and time-worn antiques. The takeaway: You don’t have to tear out existing features; you just have to get creative.
As a challenge to herself, Victoria Sass, of Prospect Refuge Studio in Minneapolis, decided to lean into some of the cast-off trends she remembered from her Midwest childhood home. Rather than removing the golden oak paneling, she installed it and left it bare. She took wall-to-wall carpet even further by bringing it up the sides of the walls, and she fully upholstered a custom, angular desk in floral chintz fabric, complete with laminated drawers reminiscent of retro, plastic couch covers. The curved ceilings got a spackle effect that hinted at a popcorn ceiling. Her space was unlike any other in the show house but still felt cohesive and surprisingly fresh, proving that trends are what you make of them.
