Ep. 427: Crafting Contemporary Elegance with Kim Lapin

28:48Because if we have that right, then everything else can be flexible. Like I can do some big box purchases for furnishings, if we had the foundation, right. But if we don't have that, right, then it's going to be a mess. So it's really one of my biggest priorities when it comes to budget and how I started the design training project. Okay. Something that really surprised me when looking at your portfolio. You are not a table lamp girl. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's not that I don't like them. I just don't. Like, I already have so much lighting everywhere. I'm like, do we need it? But no, I like them if I feel like I find the right one.

29:25But it's not that I'm against them. I don't know. I've never thought about it. Even the shrug you just did tells us a lot. No, it's... You're a sconce lady. Yes, yes. I'm a sconce gal. So you wanted a whole hard, you know, like a fix. Yeah. It wasn't really until maybe the second or third time going through your portfolio that I even noticed it because it's not as though there's like a hole. So it just, I finally, at one point I was just like, she like doesn't have any lamps. But anyway, so I just thought. surprising so true but um but like you said you i guess you've added you put so much care into um maybe the ceiling fixtures and the sconces that it's not necessary um and i guess maybe it does sort of create more of that edited down look that we're gonna achieve so anyway it just it kind of surprised me because i i feel like many designers are like the more lamps the better and okay so I have a comment about this so I totally like when you said that I was like is that true do I not have you're right I have three kids under five cords it's a disaster I have two dogs that barrel through my house and when I'm designing anyone's house I'm like designing it from my perspective of like what would I want and not want as the homeowner and like if the if the table lamp is like five feet from the wall where it would be plugged in, of course, I know we have cordless lamps and stuff.

30:56But I just mean like some of the vintage ones that I really love have cords and there's logistics to it where I'm like, that will be really inconvenient. And then there's going to be like a power cord or there's going to be something in the way, even though in the photo you won't see it, but for their everyday living, it will be there. So I think that is why, like without realizing that's what I was doing, I think that is why, as I give it more thought, why I try and hardwire as much of the lighting as I can. But for this last project right now that I just presented like two weeks ago, I do have some vintage like floor lamps and table lamps.

31:28It's just funny that you just said that. So I'm like, actually, it's because I'm thinking like, you know what, it would be nice to layer even more lighting. But this particular space, the sofa is close to the wall because it's kind of like a formal sitting room and it's smaller. So you're not having like a cord running like five feet to get to the wall or like logistically I'm like chipping hazards little babies kids you know like that's I think that's why but that's a good point yeah I never thought of it it's not like missing like I said it's not like I it took me several times to go through but um but yeah and it does make me curious to figure out like what would be the perfect floor lamp or the perfect table lamp for you I know well it would have to probably at this point in my life and if I'm working for all of my clients except for actually except for two right now that have like young kids and so I guess I'm yeah I'm just always thinking about it from that perspective but I guess it would have to be like cordless because like what I guess or in the ground a lot of these homes we're doing full gut run in the ground a lot of them like we're doing full gut renovation and they're not always tearing up the floor so then we're working with kind of what they have already but we're gutting the materials we're scraping it clean room to room but like if we're doing a new build yes like we could totally but sometimes there's just logistics of like hey do we want to tear up the concrete below when we're doing you have to create a channel for electrical to get to that you know there's logistical things that keep it from being realistic you guys have sent any links send them my wife record this vintage lamp center cordless well we can't have you the vintage ones but we've got vintage inspired ones maybe i have a collab coming up where I'm going to create vintage-inspired lamps that are cordless.

33:15There you go. Or rechargeable or something. Yeah. It is all the rage. For sure. Yeah. Totally. Okay. You mentioned you have three kids, all quite young. That's right. And correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounded like you renovated your current house before you had kids. So... Yeah. Yeah. I had a newborn, but yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Well, let's say before your kids were, you know, maybe interacting with the house very much. Yeah, they weren't doing a number on it. I was curious if that changed maybe things about your house that you were happy with or things that you would have redone. Just any kind of, I imagine there was a lot of design mistakes and learnings in the seven years.

34:04You know, they were like, gosh, no mistakes. No, I just knew from the beginning. No, no, no. Yes, there's so many things. So we bought the house that we currently live in in 2021. And we owned it for like six months before we started any plans on it. So wait, or no, yeah, 2021. And then we finished it middle of 2022. So it was like about a nine month process, but we got it the whole house, but we kept most of the structure the same. And my daughter was like six months old and we bought the house. And we moved in when she was, I don't even know, she was young. And then when I moved in, I found out two weeks after moving in, after it was complete, that I was pregnant with twins.

34:47So I was like, okay, well, I didn't design this house to have three under three here. So that was hard. That was a hard couple of years. Because also, like, I probably wouldn't have bought a two-story house if I knew I was going to be, like, pregnant with twins and have newborn twins. that it's just, I'm sorry, but I had stairs before and I had an accident on the stairs. So like not a big fan of a few story house. So like, that's one thing too. I kind of don't feel like you should do plaster in your house unless you have kids over a certain age that won't draw on the walls because my one and a half year old twins last year drew with marker and colored pencils all in the family room on the plaster wall.

35:34I'm not even talking for toilet paper plaster where it's like, you can kind of fix it yourself because it's like, it's like not faux plaster, but it kind of like a faux version. It's like real plaster that requires the plaster people to come out. And it is not cheap. So like, that's one thing, like if clients are like, oh, I have like, oh, I'm pregnant. I'm like, okay, well, plaster is beautiful, but maybe we do like a warm, creamy alabaster paint until your kids can understand instructions. because I can tell you, you're not going to be happy. Like I almost, I might've cried. I think I might've cried at least one tear when I saw the walls.

36:10I was so like, you have no idea, but whatever. Like at the end of the day, my house is meant to be lived in. I don't design for like one-off spaces to just be like museum, like living in a museum where you can't touch or feel anything. I'm going to have, when we sell this house, cause we're selling it. I don't know if you guys know that we're selling it in like six months because we're finishing our forever home. Thanks for people listening. Cause this is like our seventh forever home, but it's, I think it really is. But like we're, I'm done the design for the new home. I'm done almost everything.

36:46And we're about six to seven months out, but my twins will be three and a half when we move in. so I'm doing plus because I'm like okay now they know not to draw they haven't done it in a long time I feel good about it but there's just certain things that are too costly to have to worry about so if like you have little babies before that they can understand like yeah no plaster that's not a good thing I would I mean sometimes you just can't really control the upstairs or not it depends on where you live a lot of the houses you can't buy a one-story house anywhere you go but um we have like wood floors in our primary bathroom I give them baths three times a day they love to get wet and they want to lotion up after, my floors have like oil stains on them because no one is caring for them the way I do.

37:29I have an integrated stone sink in my kitchen. When my twins are done with their spaghetti, they'll like go alt me and put them in the sink. Now my Calicata Rosa, which is like a pinky maroon-y white marble, has stains and I have to get it treated all the time. So yeah, there are things that I would, I'm not doing an integrated stone sink in the next house because I need a ceramic sink that I can clean. and as much as it looks so beautiful and cool to take like a photo with like florals in them, like what, for that one photo? Like, no, I'm not dealing with this anymore. So there are just certain things that I've learned.

38:00Like I was a little too like naive because I didn't have kids. I didn't understand to the degree like how they could destroy things. So very, very destructive. And so now I just learned like, okay, I'm going to do like tile or stone floor in my primary bathroom because my little kids are going to take baths for a long time, I think. Like in that, you know, and it's in my bathroom. Yeah. So there's just like places that get a lot of like, a lot of wear and tear. I have to make sure that the wear and tear can stand up to them. So I am making those choices. And when people ask me, I love the wood, the park, the wood forest in your bathroom.

38:33I love them too, but they're white oak and they're clear matte because I wanted like light, like really like, you like kind of like what you see behind me, like just untreated white oak wood. I love how pretty and airy it feels, but no, it absorbs oil, it absorbs lotion. And if they're like, they want to do my makeup in my bathroom and if they're like lipstick gets on the it's hard to deal with and I don't want my I don't want to have to worry like that I want to be present as a mom too I want to have fun with them and not be the mom was like don't touch this don't touch that no no you know yeah so I'm trying to set myself up for success in the next house although it is gonna look so great I'm like don't watch out okay I know I am gonna be like that but I'm trying my best to learn my lessons but like do I do wallpaper in their room part of me is He's like, well, three to a half.

39:19Get an extra roll and you can always like. Yeah. Go right up over it. Totally. It's also kid to kid. So like my oldest never did one thing wrong. She's very obedient. She's like really. So I just assume they do the same. It's always the second and third kids. It's always those twins.

39:42There's two of them, too. Yeah. Double trouble. Yeah. That's a hard age. you said you're still in the thick of that so yeah yeah um so you mentioned here and on your instagram you're talking a lot about your home you're working on can you share a little more about that with us yes so um we do like i had to mention the development projects that we do so my my custom client projects and then my husband is in real estate and does investment so we do development projects as well where we will purchase a home renovate it obviously the budget is completely different because we have to be really like on budget under control there.

40:20So it's a less layered version, like my client homes, because they're okay with spending on like the Pierre Frey fabric. Like we don't have that for a spec home. But we were looking at this house that we ended up buying for ourselves for a development project. And I just walked in was like, this is unlike any house I've ever seen before. Like it's one story. It's in this equestrian part of Palos Verdes. So it's all horse trails, huge like eucalyptus trees, just beautiful. And the house is 180 degree view of the ocean, like unobstructed. And it, the reason it was sitting, it was sitting on the market for a while.

40:53And it seemed like a really good deal for a development project because it was like the square foot, what they were asking for a square foot of the house was so reasonable, but people were intimidated by it because it had three kitchenettes, three little lunches, like it had multiple of like these main space of the house because they had three generations living there. And it's so funny. It was a family. It was a friend of a family friend. And the great, great, great grandparents lived there, the grandparents, and then the daughter lived there. And she had her son in one wing of the house. And it's like 5 ,000 square feet, but on one large lot.

41:24And it's all ranch south. So I just was like, oh, I want this house. Like, this seems like a dream. And it was such the right price. And it didn't intimidate me because, hello, seven houses in seven years. I'm like, we know how to do this. Let's do it. So I called my husband and we thought our current house would be like our 10 year forever home. Like I didn't really think it would be forever, forever because in the area that we live in Palsbury, it's a small little sliver. So there's like no yard. We knew it couldn't be our forever home, but we just didn't think after three years we would be moving.

41:56But this house is old. It's going to be totally different. I live in a Spanish house now. This house is ranch style. There's an HOA. So you have to keep it true to the ranch style, but it's going to be very like French countryside vibes because we're doing smooth stucco and like really beautiful like gas lanterns on the exterior of the house in the interior of the house there's a lot of your like the european eclecticism that i like like talk about so much just layering that vintage lighting in we have a lot of beautiful like all plastered on walls and ceiling but we're doing some cool modern elements to bring in that like like the old and the new so like in the foyer right when you walk in we have a big circular a skylight with this big bull nose so like this light in a circular like is coming down from the skylight above this foyer with this cool unrolling hill light which is not vintage but it kind of has like a um art deco shape to it and so we're doing a lot of like new and old lighting but they kind of they kind of relate to each other because they're like in the 1940s 1930s vibe like a fresh take um other like themes of the house are we doing really fun stone we have there's four fireplaces so we're doing like all very cool art depo style fireplaces but like a slightly less ornate version um and then we're doing a lot of wallpaper in this house which i've not done in previous homes so two powder bathrooms that are going to be like murals the whole bathroom is going to be like a big mural with these very crazy chipolino fabricated stone sinks so like class like happy clashing happening um but i know i'm just like saying a lot of details but like i'm so excited.

43:34We'll see how it comes together, but it's more layered than what my current house is. But my current house is Spanish and Spanish style homes are like plaster, soft curves. And I lean into the architectural integrity of whatever home I buy. So that was Spanish. That made sense for this. This is like more ranch. And I feel like there's, you have a little more flexibility there because it doesn't have like one specific style. So I could kind of make it what I want, but I'm leaning into like the French Provence kind of vibes because like Italian and French are right next to each other. They go back and forth with like sharing detail, you know, a lot of stone, a lot of parquet flooring, and then vintage lighting.

44:11That's like the three line through the house. And you said you're going to be moving in six months? About everything. It should be, we're saying March, but which means June, you know, I'm just, I'm accepting that that's the possibility. But I feel like we're on a good track. It's just like, our doors and windows are like on a container, we're ready for them. But like, we're because they shipped from Italy, because we like work with this, we do a whole wholesale situation with this family friends that own this window and door company. So anyways, we're just piecing it all together. And it's my priority.

44:50But at the same time, I have my client projects that I have to prioritize even over my own home because I'm getting paid for those and we're on timelines for those. So it's difficult. I honestly never want to do this again. It's like so stressful and so fun at the same time because I want it to be perfect because it represents my ideal style is what I would do in my home. And that's what people are going to look to and think like, well, this is what you would do if no one stopped her. So there's pressure to make it look right. You know, and so I had so much like there's so much in my brain just constantly going like, is this the fact right choice?

45:23But at the end of the day, I just have to go like, whatever. I love it. And there's no right. It's just, I love a lot of things. There's a million ways this can unfold. Yeah. We always hear that from designers that sometimes it's hard to do your own space because you can go anywhere. So how do you narrow down the options? Right. Or not, you know, everything, but you know more than the average consumer because it's your job to know about the newest and coolest this and the best showrooms for this and you know the different options for construction like oh this type of overhead lighting that's trimless now and like there's so many choices but I think one of the things that I have to keep going back to is like if I love it it's it's gonna be fine like I don't have to I have to pull the trigger and just put the order in for so many things and I have to stay on a timeline and I try and do the same think of my clients where I'm like, no more Pinterest.

46:17There's a million ways this powder bath can unfold. And they're all going to be beautiful. But you're going to be obsessed with the one we have right now in the design plan. And you'll be obsessed with the one that you find in seven months. But guess what? Now you're seven months behind. But like an over budget and all these, we have to make choices and we have to move on. So I'm trying to take my own advice. Because like, the longer I take on things, we're paying two mortgages. Like that's ridiculous. list and that's stupid. So I'm having to like just keep myself accountable. Like, nope, this is fine.

46:46We're good. Moving on. This is not life or death. This is a house at the end of the day. You know, it's not the... Are you someone who has planned out like the entire furniture plan, all the fabrics and soft goods? No. Okay. You're like, you're going to do all the architecture. For my own house? Yeah. Yeah. For your own house. Yeah. Hey, Chicago. Class it up with Crocs. You know back to school is coming in fast. So why wait to find your new fave footwear? Step into a local croc store and step into your new look. Try it. Style it. Make it yours. Because the right pair doesn't just show up. It shows off.

47:25First day fits handled. Walk out ready for whatever's next. Visit your nearest croc store today. Yeah, this week is set aside for my FF &E. One week is what I'm giving myself. I give myself like two months for clients. project design is fully done everything is designed like to the t construction wise lighting is all ordered again like that's the first thing i figure out like that's how i start it's like my jumping off point and then i put the pieces together around that it doesn't always go that way but oftentimes it does um and so right now is like okay so i have like six months that's about the time it takes to get custom furniture done so i should probably submit and order the fabric so that's what this week is for literally and our development projects I have until the end of August I have to get all three of these projects wrapped up our own two development projects and my own FF &E and I'm just like why do you do this to yourself why it's just how it is like there's too many other client projects I have to focus and we're launching two projects in September you know we have a pipeline so I have to do what I have to do and I'm just like sleep is probably not going to happen for the next few weeks so that's okay what um what sort of fabric and furnishing choices will you make with the kids like any will you go different direction than what you've done in your house yes yes yes so for my kids okay so right now i have the twins have cribs like wooden cribs they're not going to be cribs at the new house because like we're slowly transitioning them out because they're going to be three and a half i'm just i'm trying to keep them contained because they do wreak havoc even on us.

49:04Like we had them in a tent because if we don't have them in a tent, they get out of their crib and then they run in different directions at night to just terrorize us. That's for fun. So we did that. We kept them in a crib, but now we have like the see-through eventable, you know, tents where they just like, yeah, it's like a mosquito net almost. So in the new house, they're going to have their own beds, like real little toddler beds. So I'm thinking, you know, I have this fantasy of like, doing like this beautiful velvet Pierre Frey, a custom upholstered bed with fun base, blah, blah, blah. No, I don't think that's very smart.

49:38I think I'm going to do like a crate and barrel bed. I think I'm going to do like a couple of cute crate and barrel Jake Arnold collabs. They're so cute, so affordable. And I have a feeling that they're going to trash them. And then in three years, we're going to have to switch the beds out or four or five, you know what I mean? But I'm trying to be able to... I need to have the high row at a certain point and you can't just spending money on stuff. And it's an expensive project. So for the kids, I'm going to make it the cutest version of the big box version that we can. So crate and barrel, CB2, something like that for their bed.

50:09And then I will do, again, their reading lights are vintage, their pendants are vintage. We're going to do like a really cute Nordic knot or something, some fun slowly rug. I'm going to drench their room in color from Farrow and Ball. And I think I might even have that crown moldings like painted on. So it's like a fun, folky vibe in their room. But no, on the furniture, I'm not, I don't have the, I don't have the bandwidth to design custom beds for them at this point. Hey, I don't even know if that would be like, let's see 12, 13, 14 yards for a custom full bed. $300 a yard. No, thanks. So I'm doing CB2 or like creating brown.

50:49Honestly, Jake Arnold's collection is so cute. So I think I might be doing that. That's exciting. I mean, do you have fun with kids rooms I feel like kids rooms you can kind of like go a little quirky oh yeah you okay so I'm doing two right now and they're really really fun to design but if I go like if I throw all the spaghetti at the wall like I was saying earlier we're doing like a really fun wallpaper really fun Roman shade and then like custom upholstered bed but in the beginning the client is always like, I want my kids to have the most special room. Okay, I got you. And I'll be like, okay, so this wallpaper is like X amount per yard.

51:28Are you? Yes, I want it to be beautiful. Okay, great. And this fabric is, you know, it's like$200 a yard. Are you sure you want me? I want it to be special. I'm like, cool. So we're giving we're kind of having this conversation one way, but then you're like, so your your son's rooms, it's going to cost$35 ,000 for the wallpaper. And then it's like, let's just paint it and let's do crate and barrel. I'm like, okay. So I love designing them. But oftentimes, the FF &E gets slashed when the budget conversation starts to happen with the GC. So that's why you see on my face when you ask me, like, do you love it?

52:02I'm like, I love it. If we could accomplish what the design is set out to accomplish. But I also am like the parent too. That would be like, yeah, no. I'm ordering the chandelier for my dining room overpaying that much money for wallpaper that will get painted on. from like, I have too much of a realistic perspective on this because I have three little kids. So as much as I would love to do like a custom canopy bed in silk, and I would love to. It's not happening anytime soon. Maybe for a client that's just like no budget and totally fine with redesigning in two years. There are those people. So yeah, when I have that client, I will be super stoked to do a kid's trip.

52:44but they all end up looking cute no matter what that's the thing like you could make a farrow and ball color drenched room with shade store stripes like we did that in our manhattan project from last year you know shade store stripes roman shade super cute table lambs okay so i did do them in that project um and like we did this really cool parma gray like colored everything the trim ever and it was so adorable and so cute and so much more affordable than the other option. So I have one more question. So your overall style is so modern, organic, cool, and you have so many pieces that feel trendy but aren't trendy, and you balance that all so well.

53:28I wanted to see if you have any tips for us on how to design a space that feels on trend, but not trendy? Yes. So I love this question. I, when people ask me like, what are your favorite trends? Like I just did, do you guys know Swike on Instagram, the Instagram account where she does the Rolodex series and she asked designers like, favorite white paint, favorite. Okay. I just filmed a video last week with her about my Rolodex and it was like favorite trend. And I just basically what I said, my new favorite trend or idea of what's coming up is just doing you and collecting things over time. over a long period of time that you enjoy and love for no other reason than it just brings you to life.

54:10That is all that I ever want as a trend. Because this whole interest in Instagram world, yes, while it's very helpful for my business and I like to use it as a business tool, I hate that everything becomes the same. Everyone just is like, oh, I like that bathroom. So I'm going to find out where she used that room and play. Find out if there's a knockoff of that light. Find out. And they just copy and paste, copy and paste. while I understand that for like the average consumer who is not looking to hire designers too much money I support that totally like you know use it as inspiration whatever I hate that even I see like designers will do that and it's like popping and pasting and I just don't think that trends have no longevity because there's too much money being spent in a short period of time to follow a trend it's such a waste of money and then you're going to want to redo your house in five years.

54:57And I don't want to set my clients up for that type of failure where they're like, oh, this was so cool. But now it's so outdated. It's so 2025. And we're in 2030 now. And I want to redo my house. So my whole thing is like, the reason I feel like it might feel like, quote unquote, trendy to some extent, but also you said, like, there is like a timeless nature to it. If I try and like lean on the, the like through lines of like historical places that kind to just always feel beautiful and cool. So like, we just went to Lake Como for vacation, and like all the floors are parquet, tons of stone. And I'm like, I see like, these are cool.

55:34These were cool then they're cool now because they are beautiful and timeless. And they're integral the way there. There's a lot of character and there's a lot of quality that's put into these things. So like, I lean a lot on quality, I only use real material. So I'm not using the fake version of anything like something that looks like this, but it's not like I did an X video recently and I was like, I don't like like fake marble looking things or faux wood or veneers because they don't last. They're still not cheap. I mean, they're still cost something. And then they just look like the fake version of that thing.

56:08They don't actually look real. So I think if you're focusing on like quality and using the real materials, you can't go wrong. And then if you're also just utilizing things that give you joy and you enjoy and you love and like they delight you and they make you happy in your house, you can't go wrong because you're just trusting your gut. You're not looking outwardly to figure out what's cool. You're just going like, I love this. So that can't be wrong. Like love, that's not up to anybody else. That's just your opinion. And so the way I design is just like from my gut. Like I, I adore this. I don't think it's cool because Kelly Worser did something similar two years ago.

56:45I think it's cool because I saw it at an antique shop and it just looks cool to me. I don't know why, it just is. It just feels that way. And if my client feels the same way, great. If they don't, then I'm like, we don't need to use it. I don't want you to do anything for me. Do it for yourself because this is where you're living. You have to love your space. So it's just, again, always having those fanfare conversations of like every single thing we put in your house, you have to stand behind. Don't feel like, oh, I have to do it because Kim Lapina is designing my home and she only wants to do homes that feel like her.

57:15Well, that might be true because I only take six products on at a time. I want it to be true to my personal aesthetic as well, but it's gotta be their version of me, you know? It has to work for them. So as long as they're not like looking outwardly to find the like acceptance or making sure they're friends, like it's like, does it feel good to you? Does it bring you joy? Do you love it? Then you can't go wrong, you know? It's never gonna go out of style if you love it. I feel like there's a ballad in there somewhere, you know? It's your design mantra that love can't be wrong. Like a rock style.

57:52I'm going to have Chad Jimmy T make me a song and I'm going to put it on my Instagram. That's going to have to be the title of this episode. Love can't be wrong. Yeah. Love can't be wrong.

58:03This episode is brought to you by Dee Dee's Discounts. Back to School Season is officially here and Dee Dee's has everything on your list. I'm talking bold styles, cool kicks, backpacks, and even dorm room essentials. All the prices that won't hurt your wallet. So don't sleep on Dee Dee's. Whether you've got a second grader or a sophomore, Dee Dee's has your whole family covered. Find a Dee Dee's discount store near you and go check it out today. Amazing. That's hilarious. Well, Kim, thank you so much. This is so fun. Your portfolio is gorgeous. And it was just such a pleasure to talk to you. You too.

58:42Thank you, ladies. So fun. Go to Houston. Go Spicey Marge. Can you tell everyone where they can find you and follow you? Yes. So my Instagram is at Kim Whippin Interiors and my website is Kim Whippin Interiors dot com. Perfect. And you're a fun follow. You have lots of tips and tricks. So everyone can hear your opinions on everything. So it's good. Okay. Thank you. Yes, I hope so. I get a lot of joy out of making those videos. So again, just do what you love. It doesn't matter what anyone thinks. Amazing. That's our show. And that's our show. You can find all of the show notes on our blog, howtodecorate.com slash podcast.

59:21To send in a decorating dilemma, email your questions to podcast at BallardDesigns.net so we can help you with your space. And of course, be sure to follow us on social media at Ballard Designs. Don't forget to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts so you never miss an episode. And please leave us a review. We'd love to hear your feedback. Until next time. Happy day, ladies. Bye.