Celebrity designer shares affordable advice

Kathryn Ireland is a designer to the stars, and when you meet her, you understand why — she’s as entertaining as they are.

Ireland seems to have no privacy concerns, revealing all about her work and her homes in interviews, books and articles. And she drops occasional stories about her famous clients, too.

Her credits include actor/author Steve Martin, her first client; playwright David Mamet, a Chicago native; and actress Julia Louis-Dreyfus of “Seinfeld” fame.

Bravo’s “Million Dollar Decorators” brought a high-profile, if contentious, run, and House Beautiful named her in its 100 top U.S. designers.

“Kathryn’s signature style has been described as comfortable, bohemian, and family friendly with large doses of color and a lack of orthodoxy,” says her Bravo bio. Ireland’s own description of her work includes words like comfortable and unpretentious, and she is known for mixing styles, eras and countries.

“I’m a big lover of mixing things up, combining things of good design whether a Charlotte Perriand (29th century steel, aluminum and glass) with Louis XIV (elaborate, gilded) or an 18th century Swedish bench or 18th Century desk with a fifties chair,” she said in an interview. “Each piece stands out on its own. I can’t buy things for the sake of filling a house. That’s not who I am.”

Both her house in the Los Angeles area and her 300-year-old farmhouse in France are featured in her writings and in talks like a recent one at Chicago’s Merchandise Mart.

Currently she’s working on a client’s 14,000-square-foot European-style house — fireplaces from France and a front door from Italy — on a horse ranch in Sun Valley, Idaho. And while she insists she always stays within her budget, she’s not afraid to splurge on that perfect piece for a space.

She found online a 17th century table with a dark blue thick stone top that had been used for cutting fish. It was the right height for a kitchen she was designing in the West. The price: $50,000. The location: The East Coast. Yes, she went to see it before buying it. And then she had to ship it across country.

You may not be able to fly Ireland in to give you advice on colors and accessories, but you can purchase her fabrics, and we’ll relay her decorating tips.

Textiles are her passion, and her first line in 1997, inspired by an antique quilt she inherited, contributed a paisley that is still in her collection. Her newest offering takes from both Mexico and Morocco, which she says have “incredibly similar aesthetics,”

And why do people need a designer to help create this charming bohemian decor?

“I’m an editor. If you let a client loose in a design center they don’t know what to do. I tell them I’m the insurance policy to stop you making mistakes. Don’t go off behind my back and buy something.”

Here are trends and tips from Kathryn Ireland:

Ÿ ”I always start personally with textiles unless somebody has a great rug or art collection. I focus on the color schemes, the important pieces of furniture. I want the look.”

Ÿ If you like the color pink, you might be attracted to her work. That’s the best-selling hue in her collection.

Ÿ Shop 1stdibs.com, where you can search the stock of many dealers. “If you need a 19th-century ladderback French chair, they find it. The Internet has changed our industry.”

Ÿ Another website the British native likes is onekingslane.com, where designers post items for sale.

Ÿ Many designers say every room needs some black. You know Ireland is different when she says the critical shade is red. “It might just be a lamp shade or trim on a pillow.”

Ÿ Speaking of lampshades and pillows, her fabrics make quite an impression on both. When you put lampshades on your chandelier, make each one a different fabric, she suggests.

Ÿ ”I’m a big, big believer in recycling. I go through what people have. They might have something from Grandma that they think is an awful old thing. But I give it new fabric and sometimes paint or strip it. Give them a fresh new life.”

Ÿ And that’s a good thing because she also believes: “A house is not a home if it’s all good taste. You get given things that mean things to you. It’s the way you put things together, I always tell people. Excess is finally over. Things from the attics can be fixed.”

Ÿ “It’s about living. It’s about creating spaces that are comfortable for whoever you are. I need to figure out who the clients are and how they’re going to live. ‘Are you all going to sit around television and eat sloppy food?’ ”

Ÿ And the most common decorating mistake: “The room is overproduced. There’s too much going on. One too many ingredients, and you’ve ruined the dish. The design has to be from your heart. It can’t just be academic.”

Ÿ She hangs an expensive contemporary picture in the kitchen of her French country house, not over the mantel in the living room. “You’re going to see it more there. Put something wherever it is right.”

Ÿ One of her best finds: “I found these prints in Sussex. They’re 13 Jesuit prints, and I paid $5. I framed them for roughly $8,000 (do you think she’s kidding here?) They turned out to be 17th-century copper plate worth $50,000,”

Ÿ And that’s one of the delights of being a designer: “Finding something; getting to live with it and then marking it up. One of my three sons came home one day and said, ‘What happened to my desk?’ ‘Sold. Sorry.’”

Ÿ Ireland’s mantra: Color, color and more color. “A lot of people are really frightened of color; it’s so uplifting; you get a lot of bang for your buck in color.

Kathryn Ireland information

<B>Products:</B> Kathryn Ireland sells products and posts information and photos on her website, <a href="www.kathrynireland.com">kathrynireland.com.

Latest book: “Summer in France,” (Gibbs Smith, $35); she also wrote “Classic Country” (Gibbs Smith, $39.95)

Fabric: Available through designers at John Rosselli & Associates showroom in the Chicago Merchandise Mart</a><B></B><B></B>