Prized Heirlooms Find Fresh Context In This Colorful Brooklyn Home

Details

pastel living room with built-in...

“We wanted the loft-like living room to be a palette cleanser,” says designer Cheryl Setting Mosher, who alongside fellow designer Erin Fearins, chose Benjamin Moore’s Glass Slipper paint for the custom bookshelves. Anchoring the room is the clients’ own drum coffee table and a set of heirloom wood chairs recovered in a Pierre Frey floral fabric.

prayer room with schumacher wallpaper

A bespoke combination of four different wallcoverings–all Martyn Lawrence Bullard for Schumacher—lends regal flair to the prayer room of this Brooklyn Heights apartment designed by Cheryl Setting Mosher and Erin Fearins. Complementing the pierced brass pendant light by E Kenoz is a vintage bench recovered in a carnation pink silk found at a Paris flea market.

traditional dining room with antique...

The clients’ antique dining set holds pride of place. Window treatments of Pierre Frey’s Braquenié La Pannonie fabric create a moment of grandeur. The Kutani porcelain lamps were scored at A Touch Of the Past Antiques in Lambertville, New Jersey.

open living room with fauteuil...

One of the clients’ many prized carpets grounds the open-concept living area, where a set of fauteuil chairs redone in Scalamandré velvet with icy blue silk Samuel & Sons piping joins a cozy built-in window seat. The Louis XV footstools have needlepoint upholstery and the Made Goods accent table was gold-leafed in-house.

blue bedroom with persian rug...

A Persian rug from Pasargad Carpets crafts a vibrant base for a guest bedroom, which is offset by walls painted Benjamin Moore’s Yarmouth Blue and cream silk drapes. Hand-painted designs by artist D.J. Schmidt on the vintage headboard tie to the ornate Aerin for Visual Comfort & Co. chandelier.

main bathroom with floral and...

A floral and gold Boussac wallpaper via Pierre Frey adds sparkle to the main bathroom without detracting from the views. Working with the existing travertine tiling, Fearins and Mosher designed a feminine double vanity with Breccia Capraia marble counters from ABC Stone. The mirrors are from Anthropologie and the sconces are Visual Comfort & Co.

Designers Cheryl Setting Mosher and Erin Fearins recall getting chills upon meeting their soon-to-be clients, a couple with two adult daughters. After decades of living and working overseas, they were at last putting down roots in a sunlit Brooklyn Heights apartment. “The family had bounced around the globe for the entirety of their lives, and the daughters basically said, ‘Our mom has always tried to make each place we’ve lived in really comfortable for us. This is her time to have a place to make her own,’” says Fearins.

Naturally, conversions began with shopping the clients’ antiques and heirlooms, which had languished in storage awaiting their turn. A vast collection of fine carpets purchased far and wide was carefully inventoried and used as a jump-off point. Next, choice pieces were selected and reimagined the suit the context, all laced together by an unexpected palette of pinks, blues and mints. The question of “how do we take these things that are really precious and try to use them in ways that make sense?” was key to the project, says Fearins, who’s now a partner of Studio SFW. Where a beloved dining table was given pride of place in its original form, other pieces, like a set of ornately carved wooden lounge chairs and sofa were redone in a fresh floral velvet to lighten their spirit. “We went through everything, asking ‘Do you love it? Do you want to save it? Do you want to sell it?’ Then we filled in with new, old, vintage and antique,” explains Mosher.

The designers also delighted in personalizing their first-ever prayer room, a cozy, pattern-laden space that celebrates the family’s faith and South Asian heritage. There, four different wallpapers were deconstructed then pieced together in a bespoke design reminiscent of the intricately tiled rooms of Spain and Morocco. Injecting color into the neutral space, flashes of pink in the clients’ rug and tapestry inspired the peachy silk velvet upholstery on the antique bench.

Bedrooms, meanwhile, introduce another spin on saturation. “The strategy for the bedrooms was to pick one color, and then apply it to everything. Doors, casings and base boards are a satin or gloss version of the same color on the walls,” explains Fearins. Personalizing each chamber one step further, the designers referenced The Grammar of Ornament by Owen Jones, creating mockups of Indian-inspired designs that were then hand-painted onto vintage headboards.

Freshly renovated, the as-delivered bathrooms were crisp and lovely, but that didn’t stop Fearins and Mosher from packing punch there too. The main bathroom was completely transformed alongside general contractor Marty McKenna with a feminine, brass-rimmed custom vanity, gold-toned hardware and sconces, and a warm floral wallpaper that plays tonally to the existing travertine. “That bathroom has amazing light and views of the port and Statue of Liberty,” says Mosher. “The ground of the wallpaper is matte gold, which makes the room glow. We wanted it to feel like bathing in a garden.”

There’s a similar sensation felt throughout the home: drama and eclecticism meeting softness and light. “There’s vibrance but also a feeling of ease. Nothing hits you over the head, but there are so many delightful things to see around every corner,” says Fearins. “The clients were very into color and pattern, and we loved them for it,” agrees Mosher. “But there’s daintiness too—and plenty of places to rest the eye.”