Hello from New York City! I’m skipping my ‘design notes’ post today as I couldn’t resist sharing a few photos from the weekend so far. The window displays at Bergdorf Goodman are always a must see. Currently on display, a fierce and fabulous celebration of 20 years of Christian Louboutin on 5th Avenue and the year of the dragon. As you’ll see I’ve been having fun with Instagram this weekend. We’re off to the D&D Building today. Hope you have a great Monday!
Nyla Free Designs is a full service Calgary Interior Design studio. Our goal is to bring your home to life by revealing your style and infusing unexpected elements of design and detail. If we can help with your project please let us know! See the contact page to get in touch.
Nyla Free Designs also offers an online design service through Design in a Box.
Last week was a flurry of activity over here at Nyla Free Designs. If you’re wondering what I’ve been up to, I spent all last week, along with a team of people transforming a historic Calgary home for the Kids Help Phone Homes for the Holidays house tour that happened this past weekend. The architectural details in this home are stunning. Arts and crafts in style, this grand home is warm and welcoming. I can’t wait for you to see inside.
On Friday a scout from Western Living Magazine came by to see the home as they were considering it for their 2012 holiday issue and I’m thrilled to say they decided to photograph it. We have delayed take down by one day and I’ll be spending today styling and helping with the photo shoot. Very excited!
In the meantime I made sure it was ok to share close up shots of a few areas of the home. (I can’t give it all away now can I?)




I’m afraid that’s all for now. You’ll have to hang on for Western Living’s holiday issue out November 2012.
Special thanks to the following people who helped with set up. Your time and efforts in helping pull this all together is appreciated more than you know. Cory, Cathy, Libby, Marnie, Pat, Donna, Rosalind, Nancy, Sharon, thank you all!!
A huge thank you to the suppliers who donated, lent or provided services for the decor. Canadian Tire MacLeod Trail South, Pottery Barn, Crate and Barrel, Kore Onsite, Reid’s on 17th, The Flower Group, JVR Landscaping. I am so grateful for your generosity of product and time. Many of you are a huge part of my business on a regular basis and I can not thank you enough for the help you have given me.
To the Kids Help Phone coordinators and volunteers, thank you for inviting me to be apart of this wonderful experience. I could not have asked for a better home. And to the lovely homeowner, thank you for being so gracious. It was a pleasure decorating your home for the holidays.
Nyla Free Designs is a full service Calgary Interior Design studio. Our goal is to bring your home to life by revealing your style and infusing unexpected elements of design and detail. If we can help with your project please let us know! See the contact page to get in touch.
Nyla Free Designs also offers an online design service through Design in a Box.
Last week I attended a showing of the Telio Fall 2012 fabric collection at DWA Interior Furnishings. Wowie! Lots of lovely eye candy in every kind of texture, pattern and style imaginable. Telio is a large fabric house representing several lines. You’ll find an array of modern to traditional, from countries like Spain, France and beyond, in silks, linens, velvets and sheer metallics, not to mention price points to suit almost every comfort level. Here is a peak at some of my favourites.
RUBELLI – vintage velvets with a heathered look and oh so soft to the touch.
NOBILIS – fresh colour with a linear embroidered detail on linen from the Swing & Smart collection.

JIM THOMPSON – large scale pattern with a bold and fun mix of colour (top) and co-ordinating embroidered dotted stripe (shown with floral, bottom).
PEPE PENALVER – modern global feel with muted colours, textures and patterns from the Out of Africa collection.

SONIA RYKIEL – bold colour combinations and graphic patterns oozes confidence and creates a statement in any room.
I loved this quote from Julien Hakoun during the presentation:
“The most important thing to me, are the feelings, the sensation you get from the fabric.”
Fabrics are not only about covering, draping or serving a purpose. They evoke emotion and can be a captivating element in the space if carefully chosen. Telio manages to accomplish all of these details with this fall’s collection. Simply gorgeous.
See something you like? Let me know, or designers please contact your local Telio representative to see these fabulous fabrics first hand.
Nyla Free Designs is a full service Calgary Interior Design studio. Our goal is to bring your home to life by revealing your style and infusing unexpected elements of design and detail. If we can help with your project please let us know! See the contact page to get in touch.
Nyla Free Designs also offers an online design service through Design in a Box.
Summer is drawing to an end, kids are back at school and we’ll soon find ourselves spending more time indoors. I’ll be talking about what’s new for Fall in the world of design on Breakfast Television tomorrow morning. Would love it if you tuned in, but if you happen to miss it I’ll have all the items I talked about on Wednesday’s blog post.
Image via BT Calgary Facebook page. ‘Outdoor Lounger’ segment June 14th, 2011.
Nyla Free Designs is a full service Calgary Interior Design studio. Our goal is to bring your home to life by revealing your style and infusing unexpected elements of design and detail. If we can help with your project please let us know! See the contact page to get in touch.
Nyla Free Designs also offers an online design service through Design in a Box.
Last Thursday was a pretty exciting day. I woke up like any other. Got dressed in an outfit I had carefully planned. Walked out of my hotel and made my way to an incredibly busy intersection in Toronto. I found a parking spot and took a deep breath. I walked out of the parking lot onto a street filled with people and had trouble navigating my way to find the right building. I had to ask where the entry door was. Ah yes, right there. Silly me. I walked into the reception area and thankfully found familiar faces. I had a quick re-cap and then off to have my make up done. Next I found myself in the same room as Tracy Moore, Kimberley Seldon and Brian Gluckstein. Totally surreal.
The next hour was filled with much excitement and many emotions. I took in every. Last. One.
Tomorrow my debut appearance will air on City Line with my segment on custom carpets. Tune in to CityTV at 9am, watch live online or after the show. So many of you have been such a huge support in cheering me along and I can’t tell you how much that means to me.
xo Nyla
ps. my article in Dabble Issue 4 is on custom carpets so stay tuned for the inside scoop on the designers process when making selections. The next issue goes live August 29th.
Nyla Free Designs is a full service Calgary Interior Design studio. Our goal is to bring your home to life by revealing your style and infusing unexpected elements of design and detail. If we can help with your project please let us know! See the contact page to get in touch.
Nyla Free Designs also offers an online design service through Design in a Box.
I’ve done a few projects outside of Calgary and most recently a Lake House property in the Okanagan. I don’t often get the opportunity to see the end result and help pull all our hard work together but today I’m headed to Kelowna and could not be more excited to see this place come together.
Our goal was to create a casual, beach-y feel that is stylish and family friendly. Here’s a sneak peak at some of the pieces we have on the truck ready to be unloaded and welcomed into their new home.
I hope to take lots of pictures and share some of the results with you!
Have a great day. I know I will :)
Sunbrella fabric, Ikat pillow, Chair, Bedding, Sectional, Chevron rug, Platform bed, Blue pillow, Floor lamp, Yellow patterned pillow, Coffee table.
If you love fabrics as much as I do then you’re sure to enjoy the eye candy below. As a designer we get the inside scoop on new introductions and products. One of my favorite things to do is attend ‘fabric shows’. They are like fashion shows without the runway. Large, beautiful pieces of fabric draped in front of us to touch, feel and gawk at the feast of colour and texture before us.
Last week I attended a showing of the JAB/Chivasso Spring 2011 Collection so naturally I wanted to share. JAB is a leader in the fabric industry and one of the largest fabric houses in the world. Their repertoire consists of everything from traditional to modern, while covering a wide range of price points to meet every budget. Here’s a peak at what I saw……


Grandezza Collection Vol. V is a stunning mix of silks and sheers with hand stitched intricate details.



The white passion collection, one of my favorites of the show is a stunning mix of textures, patterns, sheers and 3-dimensional details.
Fabulous heavy duty linens fit for upholstery and drapery in a rainbow of beautiful colours.
Matlasse Collection is reversible and washable. Perfect for bedding and interesting drapery applications.




Blueprint Collection was by far my favorite, in particular the metallic printed frames on a natural linen background. Stunning!
Well there you have it. An array of fabric fabulousness in the JAB/Chivasso Spring 2011 Collection.
A benefit of working with a designer is the access to fabrics such as the above that are only available to the trade, so if there is anything here that piques your interest, let me know!
I have many ideas of a perfect day. After a much needed sleep in, I’m going to grab a latte and stroll through a neighborhood I’ve been wanting to get to for sometime now. All with my husband and a really good friend. I can’t think of a better way to spend my Friday.

I’ll be sure to let you know about any fabulous finds in the Leslieville area. Happy weekend to you!
Image credits: Toronto, sleep-in, latte, map, eames chairs, Hardware, lighting
Today I’m off to Toronto for a whirlwind two days of designer fabulousness.
On Thursday I have a full day of shopping planned to many of the fabulous design stores in Toronto. There are several that I would like to visit, however there is not enough time in this day, or trip for that matter to make it to all of them. I think we have it narrowed down to 10 or so LOL! There are specific items I am looking for that I hope to find for clients and I’m sure along the way there will be many other treasures to be found.
What started out to be a casual dinner among twitter buddies, has turned into quite the evening event. Meredith Heron and Sonya Kinkade have organized a fabulous night at Nota Bene where I will have the opportunity to meet many twitter friends, finally face to face! And it doesn’t stop there. City Line (with camera’s I’m told) as well as Style at Home magazine (who are bringing prizes!!) will also be attending. How great is that?! Thanking you all in advance for your efforts in putting together an amazing evening!
Friday *early* morning I have a coffee date that I am truly excited about and then off to one of the main reasons for making the trek east. I’ll be at the doors of the Interior Design Show at the stroke of 9am. No time to waste as there is plenty of inspiration to be had at IDS.

Have you heard about Dabble Magazine? It’s a new online publication launching February 28th. Design. Travel. Food. What’s not to love? I’ll be hanging out with the Dabble gang on Friday afternoon. So excited about this!
If I have any energy left, I’ll be out for dinner on Friday night with great friends and hopefully even my little bro :)
Phew! That’s what I’ll be up to in the next 48 hours and I’ll be sure to let you know how it all goes.
Install days are filled with the work of unpacking boxes, placing furniture and accessories, hanging art and drapery, arranging flowers, and cleaning up the mess you just made all before the client arrives home for the reveal.
Last Friday I completed the installation for a clients great room. You can see the sneak peak at the samples and materials here.
We (me and my helper Sandra) started the day at 9am. When we arrived at the home the delivery truck was already there. I greeted my client and walked her through the details of the day. (I asked the delivery guys to sit tight until she was gone). No peaking!
Finally off she went for the day and we got underway. First ~ the before photo of the space. (Don’t worry…the red plate did not stay there!)
Typically I would delivery everything at once, however as you can see there are two chests that have been there for several months. They were part of the scheme I presented however based on the fact that they were selling like hotcakes, we scooped them up several months ago. They have been patiently waiting for the rest of the furniture to pull the room together.
9:30am my drapery installer arrives. Once again I ordered the drapery from Layers and Layers. A simple cotton/linen blend with a contrasting side band on each panel. Half way through, my installer notices that we are short rings, and enough rings that we could only hang one panel in the great room. SO disappointing, but we move on. I order more immediately. The remaining drapery will be installed later this week, so our reveal will be incomplete. Boo hoo!
11:00am I high tail it out to pick up some items that did not fit into my car the day before. Note to self “shop earlier so you can have the delivery company pick up for you”!! I gathered what I needed, picked up flowers and light bulbs and made my way back to site.
In the mean time Sandra received another piece of furniture at 11:30 and worked on accessorizing.
1:00pm the art installer arrives and begins hanging our selected pieces.
We had originally advised the client to come home at 2:30, however at this point we knew we would not be ready. I gave her a quick call and bought ourselves another 1/2 hour. Pweh!
The remaining few hours were nose to the floor trying to get everything perfect for the reveal. At 2:40 this is what the space still looked like. Yikes!
Stay tuned to see the final results!
Recent Comments