Room of the Day: Changes Come at the Speed of Life

Life isn’t static, and neither is interior design. With this Chicago family, interior designer Julia Buckingham found herself going with the flow. She started designing the house for a newly single woman with kids, switched gears to incorporate the woman’s new husband and pivoted again to make a nursery for their new baby. It’s enough to keep any designer on his or her toes.

One space in the home works for the whole family. The living room and entryway technically are two rooms, but their functions and a large passage between them make them read as one.

Room at a Glance
Who lives here: A couple and their 3 kids
Location: North Shore neighborhood of Chicago
Size: Living room: roughly 308 square feet (28 square meters); entryway: 187 square feet (17 square meters)
Tip: Don’t let a room’s original purpose dictate your design.

When the project began, Buckingham, of Buckingham Interiors + Design, was designing a home for a newly divorced woman with two kids. The client wanted to transform the old house into a private oasis for herself and her boys — something that was colorful and not too feminine. “The goal with the entry and the living room was to make something that was happy,” Buckingham says. “I wanted her to walk in the front door and smile.”

Buckingham started the room with the rug. “My client saw it and fell in love,” she says. “Right away she identified it as ‘her rug,’ and it became a have-to-have item.”

It’s possible that no one would describe the exuberant purple and white piece as retiring, so Buckingham was charged with making it work in the room. It was a task she gladly embraced. “I tell people that if something really speaks to you, you get it, even if we don’t know where it’s going to go,” she says. “In this case the rug is like a big piece of modern art on the floor.”


With that in mind, the interior designer lets the art take center stage by placing interesting, noncompeting pieces on top of it. The client already owned the gray sofa, the new settee is covered in dark leather, and the coffee table is crafted from black metal and glass. “I needed to keep those pieces dark to keep the room from being overwhelming,” Buckingham says.

To prevent the room from being all about the rug, Buckingham installed two tall spindle-inspired armchairs. “You want the eye to travel around the room, not just rest on the floor,” she says. “These chairs are extremely tall; they draw the eye up.”

The splashes of orange and coral (vase, throw, chair upholstery) also keep the eye roving.

Coffee table: Wayfair; smaller sofa: Roche Bobois; armchairs: Noir


Buckingham describes herself as an accessories addict and uses a broad array of pieces to bring personality to a room. Two classic Milo Baughman chrome shelves flank the room’s entry and are filled with treasures from small statues to alabaster grape clusters.


The home came with a large entry that, as the designer says, “was a huge amount of space dedicated to nothing.” She changed that by installing a seating area that flows naturally from the living room. “This is where you might read the mail or visit over a cup of coffee,” she says.

Wallpaper: Romo


The small seating area is directly in front of the entry door. To the right of that portal is a spacious bay window. The designer created a curved, built-in desk that serves as a homework center for the two boys of the house.

Midway through the project, another client was added. “We found out she was getting married when we had about half the house done,” Buckingham says. “We wanted to add things that acknowledged him as well.”

One of the things the new husband brought to the project was a chandelier outfitted with clips. “We installed it here and mounted their wedding RSVP cards in the clips,” says Buckingham. “We think it’s a nice thing to introduce in the entry.”

And the additions weren’t over yet: Months after the wedding, the couple contacted Buckingham with good news: A baby was on the way. They wanted her to decorate the nursery. Because they didn’t want to know the gender, they had test results sent to Buckingham’s office. She had all the accessories brought into the house in dark garbage bags to avoid revealing clues. When they brought home home their new baby boy, it was to a masculine nursery.

“As a designer, you get to know your clients,” Buckingham says. “You know their lives and life changes. It’s a special relationship.”

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