With hybrid and remote work here for the long haul, the home office has become more important than ever. While functionality is essential in any work from home space, these rooms needn’t be bland or uninspiring. Once the laptop is powered down, the home office should be able to perform other duties, from standing in as a cozy reading nook to hosting a family game night. Yet these studious lairs can be tricky to execute. The aesthetic can’t be so loud that it detracts from daily productivity; storage is critical; and it takes a deft hand to disguise unsightly charging cables and cords. In these 11 work from home spaces, designers who all appear on the AD PRO Directory strike the right balance of chic, meditative, and versatile.
Workstead
Before East Hampton, New York, became a destination for posh summer rentals, there was Sommariva, an Italianate-style residence built there in 1871. Its current homeowners turned to Workstead to renovate the interiors, and the AD100-listed firm responded with a palette that pulls from the calming coastal surroundings. To the left of the entry is the prominently placed home office, which “needed to be artful and beautiful at a glance if just walking by, but also inviting and comfortable to get some work done,” explains principal Stefanie Brechbuehler. Underneath a vintage Ingo Maurer pendant is the centerpiece Egg Collective desk, a custom order from Radnor backdropped by walls cloaked in Farrow & Ball’s subdued Duck Green.
“Crossing the threshold into this verdant space focuses your concentration on work,” adds Brechbuehler. “By evoking the landscape just outside the window, it creates anticipation for quitting time too.”
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Setess
By reimagining the original footprint of a former horse stable in Columbus, Ohio, studio Setess was able to transform once-isolated rooms into a sequence of convivial, flowing suites. One of these is the flexible office, swathed in moody sage that dialogues with the outdoors. The work from home space is filled with a constantly changing array of books, art, and objects that adapt to spontaneous meetings and entertainment needs alike. The approach, says principal interior designer Sam Nicholls, was to “lean into informality.” “The ability to not be stuck to one particular chair in one particular corner felt appropriate” for the clients, says Nicholls, who describes them as creatives eager to be “removed from the restrictions of a traditional working environment.”
Wesley Moon Inc
Two adjacent apartments were united to form this 7,500-square-foot penthouse in New York’s West Village, complete with a primary suite carved into “his and hers” bathrooms, dressing areas, and offices. One of those workspaces, where the client also creates art, features a clever automated desk that can “lift to standing height, and also has a drafting table component so the center of the top can pop up to an angle to make it easier to draw on,” elaborates local designer Wesley Moon. To instill the space with the air of a welcoming living room, Moon married South Korean designer Wonmin Park’s resin coffee table with a tufted sofa, FJ Hakimian rug, and handpainted wallpaper from the Alpha Workshops. Flecked with trace amounts of reflective paint, the wall coverings, Moon points out, “change and warm with the west-facing sky and sunset.”
Lindsay Gerber Interiors
This room started as a plain white box on the lowest level of a house in San Francisco’s Nob Hill neighborhood, but local designer Lindsay Gerber was quick to turn it into a dramatic office sure to make a splash on her client’s countless Zooms. French doors lead out to the back patio, and “sunlight streams in from the early morning to mid-afternoon. The room could take depth, and armed with the knowledge that natural light activates the beautiful movement in plaster,” Gerber recalls, she opted to bathe the ceiling and walls in lush, jet-black Venetian plaster. She then tapped local decorative painter Willem Racké to add a final, suede-like buff. Punctuating the darkness is a wall of custom rift white oak shelving dressed in inset LED light strips so that during the client’s evening video calls, Gerber points out, “there is a soft glow behind him.”
Sarah Solis Design Studio
There is an intentionally poetic simplicity to the work nook that Los Angeles designer Sarah Solis weaved into her revamp of a Woodland Hills ranch house. The antique wood desk, juxtaposed with a 1980s tubular steel chair, dovetails with her mission of eliciting “a restorative and serene environment that is very analog,” as she puts it, yet helps users achieve whatever tasks are before them in a place that still “feels like home. What I love about a desk like this, especially in the bedroom, is it’s an open space not hindered by technology.”
Cinquième Gauche
As she began to decorate a 7,500-square-foot, Tuscan-style home in Arcadia, California, Laetitia Wajnapel was struck by how the existing office setup failed to reflect her client’s personality. So, the owner of Los Angeles studio Cinquième Gauche dismantled it, replacing it with tranquil, feminine elements like a curved sofa “to encourage breaks and moments of contemplation in the day,” she says. Wajnapel also introduced a slatted wood Peca credenza that hides the clunky printer, and a hypnotic cloud painting by locally based British artist Louise Androlia. It hangs behind the cerused white oak desk, which features a Cermicah lamp and Hermès leather accessories. The desk is also outfitted with a discreet compartment for storing what the designer describes as “ugly but necessary everyday items.”
Britto Charette
On the 50th floor of Herzog & de Meuron’s Jade Signature, a 53-story oceanfront tower in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida, Miami studio Britto Charette reduced the size of a 3,000-square-foot vacation pad’s laundry room to make way for an office-den hybrid. “It was important to our client that the space be elegant and accessorized, but in an unobtrusive way to not interfere with work,” says founding principal David Charette. Formerly a vestibule, the office emanates boutique hotel lobby vibes with its Poltrona Frau desk, chaise longue, and stretch of paneling that conceals the AC closet and doubles as a gallery wall. A custom wood and bronze shelving system was “designed to appear as if it is detached from the wall,” adds founding principal Jay Britto, and “the clients loved the rich walnut wood found in yachts, as it warmed up the white wall coverings.”
Avery Cox Design
Previously a guest room and storage space on the third floor of an Austin residence, this home office is used just as much to unwind with yoga as it is to work. Given its challenging dimensions, local designer Avery Cox “opted for a full wash of color to make the room feel much bigger and eliminate any visual distraction. By building the bookcases all the way to the ceiling, we make the room feel taller, using all available height,” she explains. The dominant soft green tone is matched by pops of saturated velvet, layered lighting that maximizes low ceilings, and privacy-enabling pocket doors.
Terri Ricci Interiors
Inside a seaside hideaway on one of New England’s scenic islands, Connecticut-based designer Terri Ricci crafted an office clad in cerused-oak horizontal boards “to bring [in] natural wood elements without feeling too dark or heavy,” she notes. Vintage pieces include a pair of midcentury cork and brass lamps from Huniford, which “make a statement without overpowering the room,” Ricci adds. Meanwhile, chairs by Brazilian designer Sergio Rodrigues updated in crisp white leather contrast with the communal lacquer-finished wood desk. One of the studio’s custom designs, the desk is a sleek spin on the conference table, and is large enough to accommodate regular group working sessions.
Cashman Interiors
Remodeling a traditional brick abode in Lexington, Kentucky, provided local practice Cashman Interiors the opportunity to illuminate a “statement house full of color and character,” says cofounder Margaret Cashman. An abundance of both can be found in the office alone. “Pairing contrasting coral and teal created a space that was energetic without being overwhelming,” she says. Visual Comfort lighting bolsters the ceiling, which the designer covered in Pierre Frey wallpaper. It melds with Quadrille drapery, a pair of loveseats, and works from the local Cross Gate Gallery. “Since we are in the middle of horse country, equestrian-themed art gives a nod to our regional heritage,” adds Cashman. A blue-leather-upholstered desk chair lends a polished finishing note.
The Wiseman Group
Overlooking a reservoir, this Los Angeles new build from Landry Design Group is buoyed by San Francisco firm the Wiseman Group’s contemporary interiors. Consider the office, where a 1930s French rosewood desk and André Sornay chairs mesh with custom silk and wool carpeting, a trifecta of Paktong metal pendants, and a collection of period Japanese bronzes. Incorporating plentiful storage was a priority for the client, and so the Wiseman Group “designed built-ins upholstered in textured silk along the back wall for an uncluttered look,” says president Paul Wiseman. Large windows look onto the garden, but when it’s time to shut out the world, the team’s handwoven, sheer curtains have “a gradation in the line details to control privacy while allowing light in,” adds design director Brenda Mickel.
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