Kristin Mayfield
Interior designer Lori Paranjape says most of her clients have a strong sense of style. The young couple whose Belle Meade home she recently designed certainly has it in spades, and that shows through their edgy-meets-high-style abode.
The first thing guests see as they enter the home is a foyer with a pink lacquer ceiling and walls hand-painted by a local graffiti artist.
“We wanted to kind of hit it hard right out the gate,” says Paranjape, who owns Mrs. Paranjape Design + Interiors.
Situated atop a hill on a quiet street that backs up to Cheekwood, the roughly 4,300-square-foot residence was transformed by Paranjape from a builder-grade house to a custom dwelling.
“Even though it might look like a spec house from the outside, you're going to find something very different on the inside,” Paranjape says. “The [homeowners] are young and hip and vibrant, and they didn't want status quo. They really want their house to make a statement.”
Kristen Mayfield
The four-bedroom, five-bathroom home does exactly that. Paranjape outfitted the powder room with a bold wallpaper that has a black and white curvy line pattern. To add a personal touch, the homeowners’ framed artwork was used to decorate the wall.
An equally striking space is the dining room, which has black grass cloth walls contrasted by white curtain panels and an oval wooden table surrounded by white contemporary chairs. A predominant detail in the home is modern and dynamic lighting, the most impressive of which is in that dining room. The stunning chandelier is constructed of glass butterflies and was custom-made in Russia. If that doesn’t catch the eye, then perhaps the provocative artwork from an outspoken Australian photographer that hangs on the wall will do the trick.
“We wanted a dining room that felt like it had some funk to it,” says Paranjape.
The office exudes a similar vibe. Paranjape applied the same black grass cloth on the walls as in the dining area. One unforgettable feature in the room is the custom neon wall sign that reads “Eight Days a Week.”
“The idea of neon was perfect for them to make sure, again, that we were not making this [home] too serious and not too suburban,” Paranjape says.
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Kristen Mayfield
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Kristen Mayfield
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Kristen Mayfield
Tucked away in a small room near the dining area is what Paranjape refers to as “the bar.” Not to be mistaken as the butler’s pantry or as a gym (a treadmill was originally housed in the room), the bar is ideal when the homeowners entertain guests. Custom cabinets painted in black were built for the room, along with refrigerator drawers that have a green finish and brass pulls. A textural green and natural grass cloth serves as the wallcovering.
Entertaining will most certainly also happen in the kitchen, where Paranjape kept the original builder cabinets but had them painted in Benjamin Moore’s Black Fox color. Full marble slabs were used for the backsplash and stretch to the ceiling on the adjoining wall where the sink resides.
The entire kitchen integrates into a comfortable living area that is punctuated with a deep emerald green velvet sofa and two white swivel chairs. Flanking each side of the fireplace are oak wood chests painted with a black finish and accented with brass toe kicks. Regiven, a Nashville-based company, built the custom cabinetry using Paranjape’s sketches.
“We wanted this living room to feel really cozy, and hidden underneath the cozy and the beautiful is a very practical layer of durable fabrics, comfortable seating, and well-made structure within the furniture.”
Paranjape says it is really gratifying when clients ask her to transform a space and trust that the outcome will be something they have not seen before but something that they were hoping for.
“When I work on a project, the goal is not to make a house in my own image; it's to make a property that is so reflective of the homeowners, and I feel like that's really what we accomplished here.”