about

What comes to mind when you think of home?

Is it a place you want to be or does it leave something to be desired?

What if your home could be a haven for you and your family?

beautiful…
serene…
graceful.

A graceful haven.

That’s what I’ve been longing for in my own home.

My name is Jessica Newell and I have a huge love for all things interior design, styling and homemaking.  This blog is my space to dream up new ways of making my home a graceful haven and hopefully inspiring you to do the same.  Through touring my own home, getting inspiration from the great big world of interior design, and finding awesome pieces to style a space gorgeously I share my journey of making home feel more like heaven.

While I always liked making my room look nice as a kid (even if it was a bit messy) and I had a blast setting up my first apartment in college, it was during a season of touring as a dancer in a national musical production that my love for interior design started to really grow.  I guess not having a home made me long for one and during the tour we stayed at a variety of host homes.  I became enamored with how my hosts decorated their spaces.  After a long day of performing all I wanted was a haven to rest in.

After that season I lived above a church in the East Village of Manhattan that me and my team of coworkers renovated.  I got to pick out the paint color – and was hooked with making our small space both livable and as aesthetically pleasing as possible on no budget.  That’s when I really started getting serious and after a short time decided to enroll in interior design classes.

At that point I had moved upstate to the Hudson Valley, back to my hometown with my soon to be husband.  After getting married I enrolled that autumn in courses at a local college and after being in school for two weeks I scored a job in the interior design department at a eldercare services company as Design/Admin Assistant.  This was a dream job come true!  I went straight to work reorganizing the studio while tracking orders for our various projects and getting to know the vendors that served the healthcare design industry all while getting to put together presentation boards and assisting the Principal Designer pick out fabrics and wallcoverings and furniture (oh my!).  I even got to fully design a small conference room at our office.  I eventually enrolled in an online interior design program that gave me more flexibility with working and studying.

Its been a few years since I had that job and I had to quit school due to some personal circumstances but after many false starts, I decided that I wanted to open my own business and I did a ton of research on what I could offer.  It all kept coming back to interiors so I launched this blog on November 1st, 2013 as a place to share my love making spaces gorgeous.

One day I’ll open the doors to a business that provides a variety of services to clients who want to design and style their homes.  But first I want to finish my training and gain more experience.  For now, I share my heart, my dreams, and my ideas with you through this blog as I take each step towards that vision of helping others make their own graceful havens.

I hope that you enjoy my little abode on the web and I am so glad to have you join me!