Tour A Newly Built Home With Contemporary, European-Inspired Style

We are in midtown Toronto. This is a new build. We worked on this project with an architect, Richard Liebrach. We were brought in from the very beginning to review plans and go through what the overall layout of the space was, and then working really nicely with Richard to get to this place. Saying what their style is is probably a little bit tricky. I would say that there was a really beautiful European flair to things, and so beautiful nods to more classic design, a little bit more contemporary as well, and so I think we've really created this interesting mix of all the things that really reflects the client. There is a foyer. It opens up into what the architect was calling a gallery. We have never done a gallery before, so this was a new version of a layout for us, but it really created this moment where we could have a black and white checkered tile. It's actually a porcelain, so super durable. We've got paneling in the front foyer, wood detailing with an extra bevel touch to it, as well as an inlay of wallpaper that's just got a nice texture. The sconces on either side really create this flanking moment for the console and for the mirror area, and then this arch situation. We've got all these moments where we've got entrances and exits into each of the spaces. Let's create this really pretty detail. The office is right off the main entrance area. Typically, this would be considered more of like a living room space in an older floor plan, but people are not really doing living rooms in the same way they used to, so this has been repurposed, let's say, as being an office space. Beautiful windows that are wrapping around most of that room and create this really fabulous spot. Also off the foyer is the powder room, so when you walk through the powder room, there are closets that are made out of drywall and look like they have baseboards, so it really does feel like it's just a hallway through with really interesting and funky pieces of hardware that are full height. And then when you walk into the powder room, we've got sketchy black and white wallpaper that has really big organic swoops to it, and then the stone itself on that floating vanity is really spectacular. And just to give it a little extra chef's kiss, we added an angle inwards on that integrated floating stone vanity, which really just, again, is a nod to the uniqueness of this home and the details that the client really wanted to capture. Thanks for watching. This house tour is presented by Scotty's Supreme. Can a tissue box really be a decorating accessory? Yes, it can, when it's from the House & Home Designer Series of Scotty's Supreme. We're in the great room, and that is dining, hanging out, kitchen. It is an entertainment space. There was a lot of conversation about how the orientation of this room was going to be laid out, and where we landed was having the TV and the fireplace on the same wall, not necessarily together, but still feeling like it's part of the same orientation, and having an open sectional so that it really did feel like you could get a flow between the two rooms. The rug is custom. The rug took almost a year to get here from the time of order, but it was worth the wait. We've got fringe details. We've got beautiful creams and blacks, a little bit of that rusty tone to it also being pulled out in the pillows. When you walk into this room, the first thing you see is this dining table, and this dining table is done in a really beautiful white oak. It's got rounded bases underneath that tie into the curving of everything else in the home. The chairs are almost sculptural in a way. They're really comfortable. They're wipeable, so they're totally durable for the family to be able to sit here as their everyday kitchen table because there really isn't another place for them to sit as a family, and it's done in a way that also feels like it really ties into the rest of the color palette in the home. This space is extra high. We walk down a few steps to walk into this great room, so we have the beauty of having amazing height, but we also have the challenge of having amazing height, and so the cabinetry had to be like a double layer in order to accommodate the fact that we really couldn't even get millwork as tall as what we needed. I don't love uppers. If we can avoid doing uppers, that's usually my preference, and so we were able to have this amazing hood with a shelf that wrapped around it, which created a little bit more detail warmth with the texture of the wood as well as a smaller display shelf below that. We've got wood on either side of the hood area, full height so that we could hide the fridge and hide our micro and oven tower as well, and then on the side wall, we've got an entirely different door style. It's way more traditional. Because we were melding together the contemporary and the more sort of European traditional vibe into a contemporary home, having details like this with extra bevels and reveals and fluting all really create an additional style moment. We played with two different stones here, so the idea was we wanted to create something that was a little bit softer and a little bit more neutral and quieter for the majority of the countertop space. We also really wanted to have this block of stone on the island, and so what we've done is we've wrapped the entire island, so the doors even of the cabinetry are wrapped in the stone, and we had to pick a porcelain because it had to be thin enough to accommodate having doors and not being too heavy, and then we wanted to create that punch and that impact by having this cantilevered bar top. There is a lot of metal holding this up and making sure that obviously it's safe and that, you know, you can put whatever weight you need to put on it, but I think this is what makes it so special. It's asymmetric. We've got this really long island and then the section of it for the seating area, and I just think it creates such an interesting moment here. Instead of having an additional bedroom as a guest room upstairs, they created a den at the top of the stairs as a family space for the family to hang out. They play board games there. They read. There is a little nook for a desk for some homework, and it has its own flavor and feeling from the rest of the home. We wanted to have a moment up there that felt a little bit different, was more playful, more colorful, and so wallpaper for us is always a great way to do that, and so this is an infusion of color. We thought having this velvet green couch would again like add to the style by making it a little bit unexpected. It's really like intense, but also so fun and playful is a really great way to just add a little bit of extra flavor in the home. It's a big primary bedroom, so it wasn't enough to just have the typical bed nightstand. We were able to create this whole little seating nook for the parents to have a place to get away. Everything in that room is unique and cool in its own way. There's lots of curves happening, lots of textures, wallpaper in there. It is funky and cool and tied itself back together to what the rest of the home looked like. The light fixture with the textural straw, again, like a little bit unexpected, more organic, and a little bit more natural, but fits in really well with what else was selected in that space. Walking into the ensuite, we've got wood on the vanity, which brings in the warmth and the texture. We talked about how we would get the vanity height to make sense with the height of the actual sink areas. Where we landed is having the continuation of the desk height for the makeup table as a stone detail that runs all the way across the vanity, and then building up the sink countertop on either side. The mirror for the vanity actually sandwiches the stone countertop, so you see it on the bottom and then you see it on the top as well. You've got the tub wall. It's done in a micro cement. It's not a massive detail, but it really creates this amazing extra moment, and then doing a curved niche so that we could get some nice shelving and have a moment there with the tub detail. It's quite a big shower, and we've got this amazing wall that's got the curved niche again, a cantilevered stone bench that's floating, and then we've got two panes of glass that are connecting the toilet room to the shower area. We get this beautiful light transfer into the shower, which otherwise would be a super dark room, but isn't because of this detail. The daughter in this home had a lot of input actually into how this room was going to turn out, so the canopy bed, the wallpaper, this was a big brainchild between all of us to get to a place where she would be really happy. She's got her vanity in the bathroom so that she can use her products, and even as she grows into the space that it will fit her as she becomes older, she's got a beautiful wallpaper detail in her bathroom as well that just adds another element of deliciousness. The son was a little bit less involved in what he actually wanted in his room, so we had a little bit more creative license in this space. We landed on this really beautiful splatter paint blue wallpaper. Again, another area where there was some back and forth with the client of like, you know, his mom figuring out like what makes sense, what they would like, and what would work, and I think we landed in a great spot. The main bathroom, which is the son's bathroom really primarily, is a little bit more masculine, a little bit more industrial looking almost with the terrazzo. We decided to put the tile extended all the way from the vanity wall all the way across into the shower area, just as another way to just add something so that we're not dealing with just drywall. It's typical now in new builds that we're seeing a lot more theaters. There's a massive couch in there, U-shape, it's all feather filled, like flop yourself in, cozy up. Darker wallpaper creating that more moody vibe. We also then have a bar area that sets up snacks, drinks. Again, we added arches. We really wanted to create a little bit of consistency. Backsplash in that space is too vertical, too horizontal. It's creating this interesting basket weave almost. Countertop actually there, the stone was a remnant piece, so we got really lucky and then also works really well with that more sage green. I think the clients are really happy. I mean, I don't know how you could live here and not be happy, quite honestly. I think it's everything that she imagined it was going to be and more, I hope more. We had an opportunity here to do so many unique details that we've not done before. It is muted and elegant. We've just captured our client really beautifully in terms of what the overall look is, which is not cookie cutter.