by Nate Berkus
Over the next couple of months Corin worked nonstop, until I finally kidnapped her for a day of serious apartment-hunting, and we discovered a one-bedroom rental with high ceilings and a view of two things that she found irresistible: the Empire State Building and a hotel that’s been around since the ’20s. It wasn’t the hotel itself that caught Corin’s eye, but the red neon sign announcing its presence: the New Yorker. “Seeing this sign is a sign,” she told me. “It’s like I’m coming home.” She was right; this was definitely a place Corin could call home. Well, at least by the time we got through with it.
It turns out my approach to design was a little bit different from hers. I believe in surrounding yourself with things you love. Corin believes you spend two weekends at Room & Board and you’re pretty much set. “That’s how I pulled my place in LA together, and it’s been perfectly fine for me.” I didn’t doubt for a minute that Room & Board has good stuff and Corin has good taste, but I wanted my friend to have something more than “perfectly fine.” I wanted to take care of her the way she takes care of everybody else.
I knew that the sofa and kitchen table she’d ordered were scheduled to be delivered, so my plan was to show up at the same time with a little surprise. First, let me backtrack: I’d been observing Corin since the day we met. I paid attention to how she dressed, which was mostly in black, gray, navy, and white, always with touches of chunky gold (think vintage Chanel) accessories mixed in. Her look reminded me of the way I’d always seen Parisians put themselves together; tailored, unobtrusive, chic. Other friends must’ve noticed the same thing, because two different people had given her coffee table books on French fashion as gifts.
I also studied the stuff that caught her eye whenever we’d window-shop together along the Lower East Side. Corin was drawn to nature and clean lines but she also had a rock & roll edge. I noted all of this while secretly accumulating a couple of shopping bags’ worth of things that I thought would reflect her style and add a layer of history to her new apartment. On delivery day, bags in hand, I walked into her apartment, assuming I’d find my executive producer unpacking her fabulous kitchen table or sprawled across the sofa she’d chosen or plotting her next big furniture purchase. But the surprise was on me. Instead, I found the woman who has run multimillion-dollar productions, who’s been responsible for managing a staff of 150 people, who’s kept a bazillion parts all moving in the right direction, crying her eyes out.
“Work has always come first for me and I’ve always put home on hold.” Corin’s lips quivered and her nose ran. “But look at this! I mean, I actually bought a sofa that doesn’t have any arms. Trying to make a home is just so, so …” She was stuck for a word, and then it hit her. “Personal.” She wept some more. “I don’t even know where to begin.” I thought she should start by blowing her nose, but evidently she still had more melting down to do. “And,” she sobbed, motioning toward a giant box, “my new kitchen table is almost twice the width of my new kitchen.”
I looked at her in disbelief. I had seen this woman exhausted and exhilarated, I’d seen her resolute and reticent, I’d seen her organize and improvise, I’d seen her inscrutable, analytical, and occasionally cranky, but I’d never seen Corin Nelson vulnerable. “Are you kidding me?” I asked. I found her a Kleenex and told her to take a breath. And then I told her something I wished I’d said a little sooner: “I’ve got this.”
Give a woman some stuff and she has some nice stuff for a while, but teach a woman how to find stuff that truly gets to the heart of who she is, and she’s got a skill she can use to make herself feel at home for the rest of her life. Corin was correct: Deciding on which things belong with you is deeply personal. I promised her that it wouldn’t take long before this cold, white shell she was living in with nothing but a mattress and box spring, armless sofa, and giant table would be filled with intimacy and grace and a sense of permanence; that it would be warm and beautiful and everything else she is—that we were in this together. I wanted to show Corin how to find her way. I wanted her space to feel like a little jewel box in the sky—a concept that seemed as good a place as any to start.
“You have so many great pieces of jewelry,” I said, remembering the charm necklace she wore the day we met. She told me she’d discovered the charms a few years earlier. “My stepfather had just passed away, I’d taken a brand-new job at MTV, and I was missing my family more than usual—which is saying something. Then I came across these charms: a starfish, a horseshoe crab, a scallop shell, a sailboat, and all kinds of other things that represent my roots. I wear them to stay connected to my memories. And I wear them whenever I’m attempting something new, something that might change the course of my life.” She smiled and added, “I wore them to that first lunch of ours a few months ago.”
“So, wouldn’t it make you happy to be able to see those charms even when you’re not wearing them?” I asked. The question dovetails into Corin’s first assignment: “I want you to go out this weekend and find three or four glass boxes that we can use to display some of your favorite pieces of jewelry,” I said. Three days later, I received an email. It was Corin sending a picture and seeking my approval on three glass boxes, all in different sizes, all perfect for her windowsill, her bookcase, and her bedroom. Those boxes instantly had my blessing. Because Corin is an outdoors girl, I didn’t hesitate to pick up the two small white porcelain bowls that I found at a neighborhood thrift shop. Each bowl was decorated with a bumblebee and signed by Boehm. They now hold her charm necklace and the bird of paradise in mid-flight.
Knowing that Corin was heading for a few days of R&R in Los Angeles, I studied pictures of her apartment there and asked her to pack up a few things and bring them back to Manhattan. “I want you to have your favorite shoes here; they’ll make you feel good every time you open your closet. And what are those pictures hanging over your desk? Bring ’em!” I said. “I want you to have photographs of the people you love and the places that make you happiest. I want you to revisit everyone and everything when you look at them.” Corin told me that her sister, Shawn, makes beautiful tableware and wrapping paper. She wasn’t kidding. The plates I saw in those pictures were pared-down, sophisticated, and very reminiscent of a New England summer. “I want her on the show! And I want you to pack some plates, too—we’ll hang them over the sofa. And while you’re doing all that,” I said, “I’m going to be doing some furniture shopping in Florida.”
Sometimes even the most unlikely spots are filled with buried treasure. There’s a strip mall in Hollywood, Florida, that is home to a warehouse most people would pass right by, but I’ve yet to leave that place without hitting the mother lode. I found Corin a night table with an ivory inlay, circa 1965, in that place. It looks exactly like one she’d admired when we were window-shopping on Ludlow Street. I also found a French vintage coffee table with a fantastic gold base. I wasn’t crazy about the top but I knew the table would be great, just as soon as Corin had a new piece of glass with a one-inch overlay cut to replace it. I also found a little gold bench with a padded cushion for her entryway. It was your basic mess, but nothing that a quick reupholstering wouldn’t take care of. Next I found a pair of Louis XVI–style chairs that I’ll be the first to admit were not pretty—but when I look at old pieces I see what could be, and it was obvious to me that these two chairs could be extraordinary, despite their worn olive-green velvet fabric and hideous walnut arms and legs. This was not quite as obvious to Corin, who was somewhat less than bowled over by the photo I sent. She texted back one word: blecchhh!
Corin’s response to the Florida finds wasn’t much better when she saw them in person. “Seriously?” she said after circling the little gold bench several times. I went straight to the phone and called the show’s art department. “Can somebody go through our fabric remnants, pull out anything in navy, black, white, and gray”—we decided to base the palette for her apartment on the clothing colors she favors—“and run it over to Corin’s place?” One hour later, Corin cl
aims I switched into MacGyver mode. She swears there were pliers and bobby pins and I-don’t-even-know-what involved, but really, I just popped the seat out, and stapled a black-and-gray print over the existing material. Now it looks like a very expensive piece where she can sit and put her shoes on before running out the door in the morning. As for the two green-velvet chairs that Corin dubbed “Viva Las Vegas meets my grandparents,” well, I had the wood painted in a high-gloss white and the cushions reupholstered in a Dior-like gray linen. They are now something she intends to have and to hold until death does them part.
Then it was time for Corin to show me what she’d brought back from her Los Angeles trip. She’d returned with the three timeless black-and-white portraits I’d noticed hanging above her desk in LA: one of her grandmother, one of her mother, and one of her sister and herself as toddlers. “The frames can all stay different, like they are now, but we’ll get white mats cut so they feel unified,” I tell her. Next came a sepia-toned shot of a charming little village. “Italy is my favorite place in the world, which is why I’ve gone on seven bike trips there in the last ten years.” Corin’s voice takes on a dreamy quality. “Alberobello is surrounded by olive groves—and I really don’t think it’s changed much from the twelfth century, when it was designed by … well, my guess is it was designed by Keebler elves,” she said. “No matter how stressed-out I get, I look at that photo and I know there’s this little place on the other side of the world and it reminds me that the world is filled with infinite possibility, and I exhale.” I make a note to reframe the picture in something that echoes its serene mood.
The infamous armless sofa got pillows from the Nate Berkus Collection. I designed the gold pouf, too; it was sitting in my office but I thought it would be much happier as extra seating in Corin’s living room. I wanted my friend to have a reading area, too, so I loaned her my Milo Baughman chaise from the 1970s. It couldn’t be more comfortable, and nothing makes me smile like the thought of Corin lounging on it after an intense stretch at work. Her plates are hung as planned, above the sofa. Also above the sofa is a piece of Asian fabric, navy blue with two slightly lighter blue footprints in the center. I found it in a gallery in Venice Beach, California; it felt like a good mix of New York urban and Southern California cool. Corin spotted a white ceramic bowl with a blue-green interior for the bookcase. It reminded us of a bird’s nest, so she filled it with two flawless marble eggs. If all it takes is love and warmth, I’m sure that sooner or later those eggs are bound to hatch. Finally, a gray-and-white-striped dhurrie rug ordered from a website galvanizes the living room.
With each new addition, Corin got more and more into the spirit of bonding her story to her stuff. She also gained some confidence in her choices and recognizing what she calls the “infinite possibilities” of her home. She even fell madly in love with an Alex Prager photograph and bought it immediately. The piece, Wrath, is a gritty, exhilarating shot of a woman in mid-tantrum. I think Corin finds it cathartic. “Remember those scenes in Broadcast News when Holly Hunter would just unplug her phone for ninety seconds, have a mini freak-out, and then get back to work? Producers need a little primal scream at the end of the day … just to get themselves ready for the next day,” she said. “So when I discovered this lady in blue letting go for a minute, I decided to bring her home with me, so that there’d always be somebody around who understands.”
When it was time for us to talk about the living room, Corin told me we needed to have a different kind of talk first. “You better sit down,” she said. She looked solemn and kind of nervous. I’m thinking someone has died while I was hanging dishes and breaking down boxes. “Nate,” she said. “I read up on you before we actually met, and there was this interview you gave where you said something that I found … unsettling. Well, maybe not unsettling, exactly—it was more, uhm …” She started to stammer and I was starting to panic. “WHAT DID I SAY?” I shouted. She finally came out with it. “You said you thought that the TV shouldn’t be in the living room because then it becomes the focal point and the living room should be about friends and family and actual living. Nate,” she pleaded, “I need my TV in here.” Once we’d established that everybody was still breathing, I explained that I stood by my statement, but I was speaking in general. “Your home is about who you are, and you, my friend, are a television producer. TV is important to you and you should have it where you’ll enjoy it the most.” I think it’s safe to say we were both extremely relieved.
For the bedroom. Corin found a simple white bed with two big built-in storage drawers that looked great next to that 1960s nightstand I had shipped back from Florida. We both flipped for a lamp with a rough, earthy, insanely heavy concrete base and we put it on the nightstand, partly because it looked good there and partly because nobody felt like lifting it again. I also handed Corin one more thing to keep beside her bed: “This journal is for you,” I said, “so if inspiration hits in the middle of the night, and you come up with an idea for any future projects we can work on together, you get to jot it down, right then and there.” Needless to say, I’ve been encouraging her to sleep late and dream big ever since.
We also added a lamp from my collection to a small white dresser by the window; its shade is a textured charcoal gray linen, and a reflection of the entire room shines in its mercury glass base. But my favorite thing in Corin’s bedroom is the two panels of vintage wallpaper that hang in their original bamboo frames above the bed. I saw them while surfing on One King’s Lane and I couldn’t believe it. They were navy and white, preppy and free-spirited, a little bit no-nonsense and a little bit feminine. They were modern but they had a history. They were Corin to the core. I emailed the picture with a two-word message, “Buy them!” Corin emailed back, “Very nice. Let me think about it.” Clearly my two-word message needed ten additional words: “Buy them before somebody else does and I’m forced to kill you!” Corin now loves them even more than I do. “I’m not exactly sure why,” she said the other day, “but they actually seem to double the size of the bedroom.”
“My work here is officially done,” I told Corin one day after arranging a vintage necklace, a couple of books, and a very pretty box covered in white shells on her coffee table. “Wait!” said my friend, going into the closet and reaching for a shopping bag. “I walked into this store when I was in California, and I saw a very special thing that I’m pretty sure belongs in here.” She handed me something that looked like a river stone, smooth and oval. “It’s actually made of iron, by a Japanese artist,” she said. I felt something weighty inside, and it made a soft sound when I gave it a gentle shake. Corin explained that the artist collects shards of gravel and sand from his motorcycle travels through the mountains, fills each iron stone with it, and then welds the piece closed. This struck me as a perfect melding of sleek, contemporary sculpture and raw nature. “Wow!” I said. “You found this incredible expression of who you are and it’s amazing.” Corin asked me if I was just being charitable or if I really loved it. I have faked my way through many a mediocre dinner, and I’ve kept quiet when somebody gets a haircut I’m not completely crazy about, but I’d never claim to love a design if I didn’t. “It’s beautiful,” I told her. “Good,” Corin answered, going back into her shopping bag, “because I brought one home for you, too!”
Corin Nelson will always be a wanderer, but at the end of this particular leg of her journey, she has a real home to return to. And whether it remains a high-rise in Manhattan, or eventually turns out to be a beach house in Santa Monica, a cottage in Nantucket, or a hut 60 miles south of Timbuktu, she now has things that tell the story of a life filled with bike rides through Italy, summers spent beachcombing along the Eastern seaboard, charms that see her through every life-changing event, and three striking portraits of strong, smart women whose legacy she is more than living up to.
(Illustration Credit 12.1)
(Illustration Credit 12.3)
Back in the early 1980s, when I was in middle school, we used t
o spend entire afternoons carefully cutting out pictures of friends and gluing them into collages on a big piece of colored cardboard. And if, like me, you were lucky enough to have a mother who was willing to drive you to Target so you could buy an actual picture frame, you could even mount that photo board behind glass and hang it on your bedroom wall to enjoy when you weren’t busy enjoying things like Pac-Man and Dynasty and New Coke.
I’m not sure when it was decided that these photo boards of people laughing, kissing, flashing a peace sign at the camera, and just plain acting goofy should be packed away, along with our “We Are the World” T-shirts and Blondie LPs, but I was really sorry to see them go.
Fabiola Beracasa is the last person on earth (aside from maybe Kim Jong-un and the pope) you’d expect to have picture boards in her home, but it’s probably one of the things I like best about my friend. One of the most sophisticated, worldly women I know, Fab was born in Venezuela, but moved to the Upper East Side of New York City when she was 5 years old and her mother, Veronica, married the late Randolph Hearst. Fabiola went to boarding school in Switzerland, interned for Karl Lagerfeld and Chanel in Paris, and today works for a downtown art gallery and as a contributing editor for Elle and Interview magazines. She’s a smart, sensitive, passionate, hardworking, one-of a-kind woman, and all of this shines through in her home. Her Greenwich Village penthouse duplex reflects a life in perpetual motion.
Fabiola may be a regular on Manhattan’s social scene, but inside this bohemian, darkly romantic person is an 11-year-old kid alone in her room, scissoring out the silhouettes of her favorite people and sticking them onto sheets of colored cardboard. One of her two photo boards rests against the wall just off her downstairs sitting area, across from a swatch of daffodil-yellow flocked wallpaper; the second sits at the foot of her tub, so she can see it while she’s soaking.