Design Is Never Really Finished , and That's the Point

There's a version of decorating that looks like this: you walk into a showroom, fall in love with a vignette, and buy it. All of it. The sofa, the side table, the lamp, the little ceramic dish on top of the table. You bring it home, set it up exactly as it was staged, and call it done. I understand the appeal. It's fast. It's easy. And for a moment, it looks like something out of a magazine.

But here's what I believe: a home that's collected feels different than a home that's purchased.

"I picked this up in Cabo. I was drawn to how small, strange, and colorful it was. It's not a piece I'd have ordered online, and that's exactly why I love it. The small gallery I found this in didn't have it on display or available for purchase. I spent some time speaking with the owner, who eventually brought this out for my husband and me to view. The best art finds you when you're not looking for it."

The pieces I love most in my own space didn't arrive together. A vase from a trip. A chair I found and reupholstered. Something inherited that didn't match anything, until, somehow, it did. None of it happened in an afternoon. It happened over years of paying attention to what I actually respond to, not just what a Pinterest board or showroom told me to want.

"Found this piece in Helena, Montana. I grew up in Helena, not appreciating the art culture, specifically the unique pottery/clay community. My husband and I were in town for a funeral of one of my best friend's Mother. On our last day, we stopped for breakfast downtown, and I sat and ate while I stared at this piece in the gallery across the street. I was so sad. My heart physically hurt. Something kept telling me, though, to go and look at this art. It was even more spectacular in person. I immediately bought it. I didn't know where to put it, but I knew I had to have it. Pieces like this aren't something you plan for. You know when one is yours." ***Several years later, as I was going through a storage box of cards I received when my son Carter was born, I found a card from my friend's Mother, celebrating the birth of Carter. It was a handmade card with a Penguin on it. ***

This is why I don't think of design as a project with a finish line. It's more like a practice. You live in a space, and it teaches you things: what you reach for, what you've stopped seeing, what's missing. A room that's "done" on day one usually starts to feel that way again in a year, because nothing in it was really yours to begin with.

This doesn't mean every room has to be a slow, decade-long treasure hunt. Sometimes you need furniture now, and that's fine, as a house has to function. But even then, I encourage clients to leave room. Don't fill every surface. Don't buy the matching set of everything. Leave a shelf a little empty, a wall a little bare, so there's space for the piece you haven't found yet.

"Found at a gallery right here in Seattle. Sometimes the best pieces are the ones closest to home — you just have to actually walk in and look."

Curated doesn't mean cluttered, and it doesn't mean slow for the sake of slow. It means intentional. It means every item earned its place, rather than just filling one.

So if your home doesn't feel "finished," good. That's not a failure. That's the design working exactly the way it should.