Lifestyle
Home Makeover With Marie Turner
Marie Turner standing her designed space at Neiman Marcus
The gift and epicure gallery of Neiman Marcus’ flagship store in Downtown Dallas needed a makeover. Like an outfit, a well-dressed room pulls together luxurious textures, a traditional and modern mix, and unexpected accessories to form a standout stylish look.
To get the job done, NM flew in rising interior designer Marie Turner. (You might recognize Marie from the pages of Elle Décor. Her work has been featured twice in the past year.) She began to revamp and revitalize the space that’s home to Hermès china, Chanel coffee table books and Donna Karan singing bowls.
“The idea was transforming a showroom into a home,” says the designer, who got her start at Christie’s and later worked with David Collins on residences in London and the south of France, as well as commercial projects in London and Prague. “This space had a lot of these large iron showcase pieces with product.”
The gallery before its makeover
The original gallery was a maze and customers had to weave in and out of the display shelving to view the merchandise. Marie’s first plan of action was to empty the room and create a blank canvas.
“We wanted it to feel open and livable,” the Santa Monica-based designer says.
The room came with its challenges. The preexisting trio of bookshelves were permanently bolted into the wall, therefore moving or painting around them was not an option.
Marie Turner placed books and decorative pieces on the preexisting bookshelves.
“What kind of dictated the design was the three floating shelves that are bolted into the walls,” Marie says. “I said OK, we are going to work with them, so I took all of the product off and I grabbed all the books and we made it sort of a study/library.”
The shelves became the center point of the space, creating a study and living room in one.
“You could grab a book and lounge all in an elegant place,” she says. “Books really make a house warm, there is something about them that really make a place nice. “
Fresh flowers, books and candle sticks top the coffee table.
Marie took advantage of every square foot.
“Naturally it was nice to have a back bar area where you could kind of walk up and showcase some of the crystal pieces that are available at Neiman Marcus,” she says of the cocktail corner she created behind the vintage daybed from local design warehouse Collage. “We found these vintage Richard Avedon photographs that are all signed downstairs, so we hung them.”
A corner becomes a chic bar.
“Then I wanted the dining room area in the room centered on the bookshelves, so everything seems cohesive and symmetrical,” she says. “As I was picking the pieces I was finding that I liked pieces that had both silver accents and gold, so when we got to the china I tried to mix both silver plates with gold glasses. Then I just thought, since we are mixing these accents of gold and silver, let’s just do it in the dining area as well. So you have the brass detail of the dining table, and then the silver of the dining chair, and then you have the gold of the cocktail table and the silver of the armchairs.”
Vintage silver chairs are paired with a golden edged table; and silver Hermès china compliments glassware rimmed with gold.
She continued the theme of coinciding color with reds.
“You have that red pop of color inside the frame of the Avedons. Below we used the lacquered Chinese stools, and then the red accents in the books,” she says.
Signed Richard Avedon prints from The Neiman Marcus Collection
“I also wanted an area where you are going to write your letters and thank you notes,” she says of the desk off the open dining area. “We found this painting downstairs too. This was a great place to really showcase Neiman Marcus’ desk accessories and their selection of fine stationary – which you don’t always know that Neiman’s offers.”
Desk accessories
“In the entry we had this big wall, which would be great for an art wall,” she says of the wall opposite the desk. “We found this bench that is ideal for kicking off your heels and throwing your purse down, and this very rare textile down in the men’s dressing room.”
Marie hung a tapestry by artist Scott Barber above an entry bench.
Marie gave new life to art she found hidden in dressing rooms and offices at Neiman Marcus to show how you could incorporate and rearrange similar finds in your home.
“We had this other accent wall and I found that tortoise shell and some stools downstairs,” she says. “It’s just another place to be decorative but not have another console, because we had a desk and a bar already.”
An overlooked tortoise shell gets a new life in Marie Turner's redesigned space.
Marie, who specializes in custom residential interior design, describes the completed look as modern, sleek and tailored with some touches of decorative glamour.
“Not everything is so modern that it’s cold,” she says. “It’s about getting some clean lines, but then being playful by adding some decorative texture and pieces that have warmth.”
A daybed is the prefect space-saving solution for living room seating.
“Even in a small room there are great solutions that can make things look finished,” she says.
For information on any of the pieces featured, please call (214) 741-6911 ext. 2208.
