Bold and Whimsical

Ranging from neutral color palettes to classic comfort, these women are leaving their mark on the Wilmington design front.

There’s a variety of reasons one might enlist the help of an interior designer or stylist. Some look for help getting their Airbnb ready for guests who are looking for the perfect beach getaway, competing with other rentals on the island for bookings. Others might look for help decorating their forever home.

Three local women are contributing their design eyes and talents to the area’s scene with recent endeavors: MORGAN BRANDEMUEHL, KERIE LORD, and KATHARINE HARRIS. Among them, their styles range from colorful, bold, and eclectic to a more refined, high-end style.

KERIE LORD is a Wilmington-based interior stylist and owner of Swanky Studios. In addition to design offerings of interior styling and staging, she’s also an artist who dabbles in painting and sells original pieces that depict Carolina Beach and other coastal inspirations.

Prior to going full sail with her art and interior styling, Lord earned a marketing degree and worked in radio and TV sales for twenty-five years. She ultimately left that job to be a real estate agent, which led her down the path of interior styling.

The main difference between interior design and interior styling is interior design works for both aesthetics and functionality, while interior styling is revolved solely on aesthetics.

“Working in real estate, I’m dealing with homes constantly and working with buyers who are trying to create their new home to reflect their inner personality,” Lord says. “I feel like it was a really easy transition just because my passion is more with design, and I was really excited to help people see the vision of what their home could be and then taking a blank canvas and just creating what their soul really desires and what makes them happy.”

Lord’s style is summed up as eclectic, bold, colorful and whimsical. Her approach to working with clients is simple: She asks them to go on Pinterest and send her pictures of what they like.

Another common question she asks her clients when styling their space is, “Where do you like to go on vacation?”

“I feel like a lot of places people like to travel to are a reflection of what brings joy into their heart,” she says.

A large portion of Lord’s clients are Airbnb owners or people who own beach houses. In addition to styling, a unique service that she offers is her artistic skills. Oftentimes, when she’s styling houses that are drawing more coastal themes, she’s able to create a custom piece that owners can style in their house.

“I’ve been painting since I was a little girl,” Lord says. “It was more of a hobby, but the older I got, the more painting I would do, and I really liked to paint beach scenes whether that’s the ocean or downtown Carolina Beach. A lot of people want to incorporate art into their spaces, but art can be really expensive and overwhelming because there’s so many different types and styles. A lot of my clients will design this really fun place, and then they’ll say, ‘Well, I’d really love a piece of art that complements it.’ I’ll either paint something for them that reflects that space using the same colors or complementary colors, or I’ll have art on my website that reminds them of a fun vacation.”

Oftentimes when Lord is designing Airbnbs, she’ll design them to stand out. From her perspective, there are a lot of rental houses in the area, and oftentimes the houses with decor that stands out is the one customers end up booking.

“A lot of people who do Airbnb want their places to stand out because there’s so much competition down here that you have to be a little bit different in order to get bookings,” Lord says. “A lot of houses are pretty plain and vanilla, but if you step it up and give your guest something that’s unique and fun, you have a greater chance of getting booked. I do more permanent houses, but the Airbnb aspect is starting to take off because people are starting to realize they need to do something different.”

To view more of photographer Madeline Gray’s work, go to madelinegrayphoto.com.

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