Designer Crush: JDP Interiors
Author:Michelle KonstantinovskySpearheaded by Joyce Downing Pickens, JDP Interiors is a full-service interior design firm focused on creating spaces that seamlessly blend new and old-world design aesthetics. The firm’s goal is to create a bold, timeless spaces with a sophisticated design palette rich in texture. Gravitating towards simplistic, earth-toned colors coupled with well-crafted furniture and one of a kind vintage pieces, the firm’s projects are the ultimate mix of old and new while simultaneously blending masculine and feminine. Learn more in our Q+A below.
How did you get your start in design?
I think I always had a propensity towards design in some way shape or form. As a child, I was constantly recruiting and convincing the neighborhood kids to construct my latest for an idea for a Fort to my exact specifications…I was quite a bossy little thing! Also, my mom always had an amazing eye for design having studied at Christie’s in London and I remember constantly traipsing through one antique store or another in my younger years with her. When I graduated four years of college with a degree in nothing that really interested me, I decided to go back to school for design thinking it would be something I could at least do later in life. Luckily, it stuck with me and I ended up working in design in LA and then started my company around my 26th birthday.
Travel has inspired your design aesthetic — what are some of the places that had the biggest influence?
Lately the UK. My boyfriend and his family are from Wales and we’ve been spending the last few Christmases there. The Brits have such an eye for pattern play, muted earthy tones and natural, local architectural elements that have really stuck with me. I’d love to have a small thatched-roof cottage there one day complete with original wood beams and Cotswold limestone.
What are some ways you blend vintage and modern items?
Found/vintage accessories are always the best way to layer in sophistication and depth into a room, but nothing can beat the excitement a modern light fixture can bring to a room. I see no reason these two elements can’t live in one space harmoniously.
How do you define “California style”?
Any style really, but with a level of casual sophistication, that other parts of the world just don’t seem to master as well. California style doesn’t take itself too seriously.
Who are some of your biggest professional role models and why?
Kelly Wearstler. No one is as groundbreaking and unique — even if it isn’t your style, there is no denying this. And in a business that’s extremely hard to scale, she has done it seamlessly without losing her vision.
Describe your ideal Sunday from a.m. to p.m.
Wake up and have coffee in bed with my little family of three, then a hike in the hills behind our house so Mouse the dog can get in her exercise for the day, followed by Sunday brunch at a fun new restaurant I have yet to try, then back home for a nap or to cozy up with a good book. Closing the night with a home-cooked meal and a great movie. Sundays are best kept simple. 🙂
Lightning round!
First concert?
Shania Twain! I am from Texas so those country roots are forever there!
Favorite book?
Harry Potter…It was the first book I ever fell in love with and nothing can give me that same cozy-rainy-day-at-home feeling like it can.
Go-to dinner recipe?
I crave something simple and uncomplicated when it comes to home cooking! Angel hair pasta with chicken and veggies usually does the trick!
Most quotable TV show or movie?
Princess Bride! “Inconceivable!” and of course Mean Girls, which is as generational as you can get!
