Design Studio
make it memorable
Designer Moses T. Zabec invites you to make your home a special place, regardless of size or budget.
Eclectic European furnishings and styles blend in this elegant dining room designed by Moses Design Group. Carefully considered lighting, architectural detailing, and an imported fireplace add layers of interest and create a unique and luxurious place to be.
Moses T. Zabec (photo courtesy of Moses Design Group)
This article first appeared in Autumn 2009 Su Casa
Moses T. Zabec
president
Moses Design Group
2440 Louisiana Boulevard NE,
Suite 260, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 505/884-3360, mosesdesign@mosesdesign.net, mosesdesign.net
Background: Designer Moses T. Zabec began his career teaching art to elementary and high school students in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. After several years Zabec returned to school for his master’s degree and fell in love with architecture and interior design. He opened his Albuquerque interior design firm in 1980, initially focusing on law offices, hospitality, and corporate projects. Today Moses Design Group comprises a staff of interior designers specializing in residential and commercial design for clients across the country. A multidisciplinary award-winning firm, Moses Design Group offers a range of services, from hour consultations to whole-home and whole-office projects. Zabec is the past owner of the award-winning Albuquerque retail store Moses at Home.
Personal design style: Historically based timeless, classic design with a twist.
As a designer, do you think it’s important for us to bring a sense of luxury to our homes?
I think so, and I think probably more now than ever because of the economic situation. We saw cocooning happening maybe 15 years ago, but I think we’re right back there. And it’s not a bad thing. Your home really should be your most important space. You should feel good in your office, but when you come home at night, that is your place of rest, and it’s personal. Your home is subjective—it’s yours. You should come home to a wonderfully warm environment.
What does luxury mean to you?
Luxury is an accumulation of styles, textures, and fabrics that come together to make a beautiful song. It is very tactile; it is extravagant; it is sensuous. It has texture. Luxury is seductive—it makes an impression.
For example, in a small room, we’re either going to paint the walls a deep color or we’re going to cover the walls with glorious wallpaper. Now maybe I put some bamboo pull-downs over the windows, and then some drapes on top of that. And then, of course, the furniture, the pillows, the rugs, and the accessories come in. Now that is a lot of layering, and it’s a lot of luxury.
What are some other ideas for adding luxury to our homes?
Detail, detail, detail. Let’s say when you walk into your home, you have a little demilune table and some photographs of your family, and you go to a beautiful vase filled with a bunch of flowers and a nice painting behind it, or a hand-carved wooden mirror—that’s luxurious already. And I’m telling you what to expect.
Does this concept apply to all home styles?
Luxury has to do with layering and the tactile experience, be it contemporary or traditional. You could have a leather chair with a beautiful hand-carved table next to it, and that’s luxurious. Comfort has to be part of the equation. It’s about details for how you’re going to live.
How do you bring luxury to a modern design?
I think there is a different statement of luxuriousness in a contemporary house. You’re going to tend to be clean lined, whether it’s the furniture or other elements, so now your texture and materials and layering really come in. You can have understated detail in contemporary design, but it is still gloriously luxurious.
Does a home have to be large to have luxury?
No. I think you can take these ideas and apply them to a smaller space. Sometimes a small space is more intimate. Most people will go into a small room, and their first reaction would be, I’m going to paint that room white or a light color because it’s so small. Actually, the opposite is true. If you paint the room a rich chocolate brown or any deep color, and then add lush fabrics and patterns and great lighting, you are going to have a really luxurious room.
We’ve been talking about adding detail and layers of interest to a home. How do you know when you’re done?
Not overdoing it is important. You have to know when to stop because luxury can turn into gaudy. Have you ever walked into some places that are a little too heavy? That’s it. That’s when you know it’s time to stop, or maybe you went too far already.
What are some ideas for enhancing our homes while watching our budgets?
Do something colorful. Add some paint right away. If you have a bare window in your house, find some draperies. You can go to less expensive stores and find a matchstick blind that pulls up, and now we have our layering. The draperies soften the window and the wall.
It’s so inexpensive to add pillows to a sofa. In the bedroom, go buy a couple of pillow shams and add some other pillows. With that color and texture, and the tactile feel of the fabric, all of a sudden we’re adding layer upon layer, and it’s becoming more luxurious.
Don’t settle for a white towel; colorful towels add a little bit of luxury. You can get a towel monogrammed, and wow! It’s not expensive, and it’s more personal for you. A few other simple tricks: paint your front door another color, paint your cabinets, or change the knobs on your kitchen cabinets. For outside, there’s nothing more luxurious than adding draperies in outdoor-weighted fabric next to your columns. It’s luxurious and softens your whole patio.
I can definitely go to any of the places in town that would handle stencils, and I can create my own stencils around windows, around doors. I can put it on my fireplace, or I can put it on my kitchen hood. There’s that detail. The more that happens in the house, I think the more luxurious it gets, and really the bottom line is that it becomes more personal. It’s yours.
What have you learned from high-end projects that can be applied to all homes?
We tell people when we go to their homes, if you can’t afford to do this right now, it’s OK. Get a master plan, and stick with it. We had one couple that took two years to do their home, but we gave them a master plan and developed it so when they had extra money, they called us, and we did what we needed to do, purchased what we needed to purchase. In two years’ time, the house was done, and it was absolutely beautiful.
We had a plan, but custom means allowing yourself the freedom to change as you go. Even if you thought you had to have this red bedroom, and now all of a sudden you’re falling in love with orange with a little bit of red, it’s OK! Just go ahead and do that. You need to react to what you see, not just what you envision.
How do you suggest we pinpoint a home design style that speaks to us?
We call it a programming phase in our business. I’m going to sit down and talk with you, you’re going to tell me the things you like and don’t like, and it’s my job to interpret what I heard.
It’s not to say that going to magazines and reproducing those ideas is necessarily a bad thing. But if you show me a picture, I can question you about that picture and understand what you like about that picture. Your house won’t look at all like the picture, but the picture says some of the things you can’t really tell me but you can show me. Now, a lot of people might cringe at this because they feel that this infringes upon their style, but many people hire us because they don’t know what to do.
I think it’s sad, though, when somebody finds a picture and just replicates it. That is not design. Nor should somebody hire a designer to do that. People can hire a designer to really bring something to their home that they don’t know about, that they can’t do—to interpret their personal desires. That is a designer’s job. We’re there to interpret what you want and bring it to fruition.
What else should we know about working with an interior designer?
To me, everybody can really afford a consultation with any designer—hopefully us—but anybody can afford an hour. I always tell people, if you go out for a night with another couple, you are going to spend what you’re going to spend for that one-hour consultation. A designer can give you a lot of information in an hour. Whether you choose to use it or how you choose to use it is your choice, but you can still get a lot of information.
What we always ask people when they call about a consultation is to have a list of questions ready for us, things that you’re concerned about in your house. I can’t say that you can do a whole home in an hour, but at the same time, an hour can really get you going in the right direction.
Where can we turn for design inspiration?
I think that the easiest way is to look at a homes magazine to see if you can get an idea. But if you go to model homes or if you’re staying at a hotel, you can start training your eye to look at things, to look at the detail. Look how they handled that ceiling detail, or look at the beautiful furniture, or look at the placement of the furniture. You’ll start deciding what you like, and that will be your style.
What do you consider to be the key to a well-designed home?
I really have to say cohesiveness. You can have an eclectic home, but it needs to be cohesive. You don’t want to have a blue room, a white room, an orange room, this style, and that style—there’s no cohesiveness. I think that’s the most important thing. Tie the rooms together. Each room should have a liaison to the others.
How can we ensure our home has a
cohesive design?
There should always be a common thread—whether that thread is a style, a detail, or a color, which is the easiest way to do it.
Let’s say the color red is going to be your thread. In one room, we might have a little bit of red on the paintings. Maybe the next room is the dining room, and the chairs have more red. And in the living room, we have a lot of red upholstery, with red on the drapes. You increase and decrease that thread, no matter what it is, and that way the house is cohesive.
Can you share an interior design technique we wouldn’t usually consider?
I think people are so afraid to paint their ceilings colors. And think about it—it’s a whole other plane; it’s a whole new look. It’s good to put crown molding in because when you have a color on the wall and a color on the ceiling, you need that transition.
What other ideas might be new to us?
Remember that pattern breaks all lines. In a smaller space, more pattern is really better. It’s no different than dark walls or color on the ceiling. It’s sort of the same effect. If you use fabric or another wall covering, exactly the same sort of thing is going to happen.
I think we’re seeing a nice return to wall coverings. Faux finishing softens up a place and gives it a lot of warmth and character, but a printed piece of wallpaper does the same thing. It sends it over the top in a whole other direction.
Can you name a design feature that’s often not considered strongly enough?
Lighting—we are really fanatical about lighting. Lighting brings so much uniqueness to a house. If you’re actually going to put a chandelier in the room, then it should be a piece of art.
We always tell people, if you look at every piece like it’s a piece of artwork—whether it’s the sofa or the lamp, even the little tchotchke, the little accessory—if you look at everything like it’s art, by the time you’re done, you will have a masterpiece.
What design advice would you like to leave us with?
Mies van der Rohe, the world-famous architect, said “God is in the details.” And so he is. And so should we be. When you want a place to be very beautiful, just keep up the detail. You should almost be relentless about detailing and layering.
Every little thing you do makes that project better and better and more luxurious—knobs for the cabinetry, handles on a door—everything you do. Embellishments are critical. Whether they are art or accessory, they are the icing on the cake. And a little different is always a lot better.