Author Adriana Trigiani’s living room
Adriana Trigiani, the writer, TV producer and author of the bestselling novel "The Shoemaker's Wife" is known for her humorous and heartwarming tales, so richly detailed that fans join guided walking tours of the places in Italy and Greenwich Village that she writes about. Her own story can be told, at least in part, with a peek into her favorite room, a comfortable living room decorated in colorful raspberry and vivid Chagall blues with high ceilings and a black and gold-veined marble fireplace in the 1838 Manhattan brownstone that she, her husband, nine-year-old daughter and a cat named Smokey call home.
What do you like most about your living room?
The light in the late afternoon. When the sun goes down the way the building reflects light, it turns blue. I get the fractured light.
What does your decorating style reveal about you?
Everything you surround yourself with in your life expresses who you are. I like comfort and color and order and books. I come from a family of shoemakers and seamstresses. Textures, fabrics — we are really into it. I would be an interior decorator if I could.
Author Adriana Trigiani
How did you pull it all together?
I am so beauty-on-a-budget. I don't have anything that is bought new. I refurbish it. My handy husband does a lot of it.
I got the club chairs -- from the 1930s with claw feet and square and deep -- in a resale shop. The ottoman came from a yard sale and it's redone. A friend donated the piano. The chandelier was there. I love a chandelier. It's like a drop earring in a room.
What's your design secret?
I collect people's rooms. I cut them out from magazines, different places, pictures I've taken. I will hunt down a fabric; I don't care how long it takes me. I am obsessive like that. The club chairs are a Scalamandre blue leopard fabric.
Where do you hang out?
I like to sit in a club chair. I like to be in a chair where I feel protected. I don't like chairs without sides. I do a lot of reading in there and listen to my kid play the piano. She practices every day.
What are your favorite pieces?
The most precious to me is my daughter's paintings. I frame them in gold and put them with the other artists. They feel like they belong in a museum that way.
Is your design style apparent in your novels?
Oh my god, yes. I am known for it.I wrote a novel about a decorator — "Rococo," in 2006. The settings are very important. In "The Shoemaker's Wife" they are huge. I'm very descriptive.