Q&A WITH ANNE HEPFER

April 14, 2010

By Laura Malloy
HOME AND DÉCOR CAUGHT UP WITH ANNE HEPFER of Anne Hepfer Designs Inc. to see what it took to create the luxurious rooms featured in Spectacular Homes of Toronto. Supported by a dedicated team of project managers and administrative assistants, Hepfer manages high-end residential projects in California, Florida, Greenwich, New York City and Toronto.

What’s the process you go through to marry your vision with a client’s personality? Our goal is to bring out the best in every client’s personal style. Our client’s homes should look like their homes and reflect their lifestyles. It’s our job to make every project functional and comfortable, marrying architecture with interior design elements. We work in many styles and try to bring out the best in our client’s innate tastes. Frequently we urge the client to step out of their comfort zone to take risks and add elements of surprise, which makes the space unique and in doing so, fun for the client.

Where did you draw inspiration from when decorating this home? I’m inspired by nature, art, fashion and architecture. Also, I dream in colour and some of my best ideas come to me in the middle of the night, so I sleep with a notebook beside my bed.

“We urge the client to step out of their comfort zone to take risks
and add elements of surprise, which makes the space unique and
in doing so, fun for the client”

What challenges did the home present and how did you solve them? The challenges were strictly cosmetic. We had to strip wallpaper out of many rooms to repaint, and the home was lacking light fixtures, so we installed many sconces and chandeliers. This house has great bones, wonderfully scaled rooms, good flow and high, elegant ceilings, doors and windows. So really, the job was just about chic and timeless décor.

If you could sum up this design project in three words, what would they be? If you make a space chic, classic and comfortable, it will forever be timeless.

What are your favourite elements you love to include in each project? (example: luxury fabric, vintage art, etc.) For every room, we design at least one custom, one-of-a-kind element, whether it’s a hand-finished wall treatment, a French 40s style console, a shagreen inlayed coffee table, a beautiful shaped tufted headboard, or a glamorous deco-inspired mirrored screen. It’s the element of surprise and custom details that make a space special, interesting and unique. The less predictable, the more fun! Not one of our projects looks the same – we don’t replicate because every client is different.

Photos courtesy of Michael Graydon featured in Spectacular Homes of Toronto by Panache Partners

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