The Colors Of Joy
To style their Glen Rock home, a retired couple dove into the crayon box—and found a designer who could make it all work.
Design by Susan Barbieri
Photography by David Nelson/Digital Tour
Text by Donna Rolando
If happiness were a color, what would it be? A Glen Rock couple’s first and forever home had to reflect their bubbly personalities, so perhaps no one should be surprised to see the rainbow unleashed with a peony wall, orange-and-blue dining chairs and other happy hues.
“They reflect our personalities,” says homeowner Anne, who like her spouse formerly worked in education. “We didn’t want a cookie-cutter design, and we both have a sort of modern aesthetic.”
The foyer, with its pink cubes and flower petal chandelier, is designed to turn heads, while the media room is meant for relaxing with tunes.
As husband Patrick explains, this was the retired couple’s first opportunity to own a home because his career long had them living on Ramapo College’s Mahwah campus. When they purchased a ranch house in 2021, it was traditional and dated— far from their preferred aesthetic. But Houzz led them to Susan Barbieri of Hawthorne-based Susan Barbieri Interior Design, whom they viewed as willing and able to shake things up.
“Contemporary, sustainable design and bright, fun, happy colors—that was our direction,” says Barbieri of the project completed last year.
Blue-and-orange chairs, which the clients contributed, say, “Wake up and smile!”
Using all Benjamin Moore paint, Barbieri looked for a boost from a “Peony” accent wall off the kitchen—the perfect gallery for the clients’ travel photos and art—and this dark pink then inspired the foyer’s versatile cubes. But she balanced out the color throughout the home with Evening Sky, a soothing mix of soft gray and blue.
Of course, more goes into a livable design than throwing around pops of color. Barbieri found herself designing for the couple’s many interests— including, for example, a black-and-white granite Porcelanosa kitchen with an easy pop-up mixer for Anne, an award-winning baker, and Patrick’s media room with custom sliding glass doors for solitude while he savors a voluminous vinyl and music collection. For a couple young at heart, parties are only natural, and the design reflects that with versatile furniture, including circular swivel chairs at the kitchen island.
Bold veining is the perfect contrast for high-gloss white cabinets.
Small, boxy rooms were not for this couple, so architect Piero Gabucci of Englewood’s Axis Architectural Group and Will Seitter of Ridgewood’s Artisan Builders created an open format for the foyer, kitchen, dining area and living room. Then Barbieri defined each space with creative flooring, such as a living-room rug by G. Fried that pulls together the home’s plethora of colors and sits atop light ash planks. (Surprise! They’re easycare Italian porcelain.) Curves in the rug’s pattern and in the foyer, where porcelain floors resemble slate, visually help “to break up the great length of the house,” she explains.
Contemporary LED lighting creates its own drama, especially in the foyer, where the ceiling was raised, allowing for the “bold impact” of Visual Comfort’s Nyra chandelier with acrylic petals. Other showstoppers, curated to work together, are Lightology’s brushed-aluminum pendants in the kitchen and Metropolitan Lighting’s Blackjack Starburst in the dining room.
Surrounded today by bold colors, Anne and Patrick have no regrets. “People get scared when they see the swatches,” says Anne. “Our painter was funny—he was like, ‘Are you sure?’ We were quite sure. Living with colors just makes you happy.”
