Interior Designs’ Founders

Interior design is an intensely personal art with such divergent tastes—so it’s no surprise that even experts are divided when you ask them to list the most important pioneers of the profession. It’s an argument that doesn’t end. It’s also an argument that shouldn’t end: As along as there are different tastes, why shouldn’t we shout Vive l’difference with all our might? With that in mind, here’s our version of the Mount Rushmore for interior design:

Most Influential Interior Designers

Elsie De Wolfe

Often called “America’s first decorator,” De Wolfe had toured Europe, been presented at the court of Queen Victoria, and already become a moderately famous actress before she found her true calling as an interior designer. She helped unclutter American homes of all those Victorian tchotchkes. She advocated use of more open spaces and, as Architectural Digest wrote, “introducing soft, warm colors and a bit of 18th-century French elegance.” With her trademark icon of a wolf wearing a pince-nez, she became the most famous decorator in the world.

More than that, she was brave: During World War I, she volunteered as a nurse in France.

A titan’s titan, Wright designed more than 1,000 structures, more than half of which were built. More than his skyscrapers, though, Wright was among the first interior designers to be considered as an artist in his own lights. As the foundation that bears his name has it, he “changed the way we build and the way we live.”

We’ve all heard the expression “less is more,” but van der Rohe, as one magazine put it, “breathed life into the mantra.” Like Wright, he served time in Chicago, that cradle of American design innovation. In fact, he’s credited with developing what’s now called “The Second Chicago School.”

And if you enjoy the spare, open spacing of modern design, you owe a thanks to van der Rohe’s efforts.

Yes, we have parochial interests here—like so many great Americans, Sister Parish was from New Jersey. Sister Parish had no formal education or formal training in design; she didn’t even finish high school.

Despite that, she is the founder of the American Country House movement in interior designs. She was so well regarded in her prime, that Jackie Kennedy picked her to work on Kennedy’s famed redesign of the White House.

Contact the team at Ron Nathan Interiors today to learn more about interior design for your home.