The Pressure on Mom

Design by Amy Greenberg
Photography by Marisa Pellegrini
Text by Richard Laliberte

Amy Greenberg considers a recent renovation in the Bel Air neighborhood of Livingston one of the toughest projects of her career. It wasn’t style or structural issues that daunted the founder, president and head designer at Mason Barrister Inc. of Cedar Grove. It was that the client was her daughter.

This unusual situation “felt like more pressure on me,” says the designer. “If my daughter and her husband didn’t like what I did, it could be a problem. Everything is a bigger deal when it’s family.” Her daughter, Jaime Glazer, was mindful of the tension. She thinks her mom “was worried about letting us down because she thought we’d talk about it forever. We’d all have to live with the results.”

For a designer, of course, these relationships can be tricky even when you haven’t given birth to your client. Greenberg had to toe a fine line between confidence in her own vision and deference to the homeowners. But Glazer and her husband, Josh, with their two boys, ages 7 and 10, relied on Greenberg’s experience and ideas, and benefited from having a designer who knew their family intimately.

“It was tough because we didn’t know what we wanted and didn’t have a clear vision,” Glazer says. “She helped talk it through and get us where we wanted to be. She was able to think of things we wouldn’t have.”

Glazer’s husband occupied a middle ground. “He tried not to be involved—but also to be involved so we didn’t go crazy,” Glazer says with a laugh.

Removing a pantry allowed the addition of a wine fridge and glassware cabinet. Designer Amy Greenberg used a mix of materials, including cabinets of walnut, black-stained oak and mushroom-colored lacquer by Frank’s Custom Cabinets in Paterson; floor tile from Ideal Tile in Fairfield; quartzite counters from Everest Marble in Clifton, fabricated by Arena Granite & Marble in Passaic; and backsplash tile from Mediterranean Tile in Fairfield.

The project, which was completed in 2022 with G&D Contractors of Whippany, focused on the outdated kitchen in the home the couple had bought in 2019. Some of the family’s favorite features developed from Greenberg’s strong ideas about what needed to change. “The whole kitchen layout was terrible,” Greenberg says. Front and center was an island with an awkward triangular shape. “The kids had to climb to reach whatever was on the counter,” Greenberg says. “It was dangerous.”

Tandem enlargement of adjoining laundry and mudroom areas led Greenberg to suggest structural changes, including the removal of a guest room, a butler pantry and a support column. “I knew what I wanted to do, and that column had to go,” Greenberg says. “We had to put a beam in the ceiling, and that was a little pricey—but it made the kitchen.”

The butler pantry became a wine refrigerator, flanked by new, floor-to-ceiling glassware cabinetry that makes innovative use of the space beside and behind the oven, all fronted by black-stained oak with a visible grain.

In a new, rectangular island, a Signature Kitchen Suite unit provides fridge and freezer drawers that can be switched with a setting and are easy for kids to reach. The designer “had specific suggestions knowing we had two small children,” Glazer says. “In the morning, when the boys want their frozen pancakes, they can help themselves. That helps them feel more independent, which we like as well.” An easily accessible microwave oven is also built into the island, and other kid-friendly drawers hold plates. Bar seats have sturdy backs, feature easily cleaned vinyl—and don’t swivel, to minimize horseplay.

The kitchen’s main refrigerator and freezer hide behind two of several walnut panels along one wall. Panels open and close by pressing, so no handles break up the warm, sleek surface. Two middle panels pivot and slide back into pockets, revealing a coffee bar with shelves and distinctive tile. The tile is mirrored in a bar station with a sink near the wine fridge and glassware cabinet.

“We love how she did the coffee bar,” Glazer says. “It looks really nice with the doors closed. She knew things personal to us that help,” she adds, so that the kitchen “doesn’t look like a disaster when people come over.”

Functionality was the key to design choices throughout the kitchen, including chairs from Costantini Pietro that feature wipeable vinyl and sturdy backs. Greenberg opted for non-swivel seats to discourage horseplay by the family’s two boys. A wet bar near the wine fridge mirrors the kitchen’s hideaway coffee bar, which is revealed by opening pocket doors that pivot back into the wall.

The couple had general notions about style. “At the time, everybody had white and gray, and we wanted something a bit different,” Glazer says. “We wanted a mix of light and dark.” Greenberg’s blend of materials includes not only the intermingling of walnut, black oak and tile on different vertical surfaces but also counters of white-streaked black quartzite, light floor tile and some cabinets of mushroom-colored lacquer.

“We just wanted to enjoy the look and feel, and we landed on something that feels very calming and more like us,” Glazer says.

The mother-daughter collaboration turned out to be surprisingly smooth. “We trusted her and didn’t stress about anything,” Glazer says of her designer mom. After all, she grew up watching and sometimes helping her mother in the design profession, traveling with Greenberg to trade shows and even working for Mason Barrister with her husband during one summer in college. “I like to work on things with her,” Glazer explains.

In retrospect, it looks as if everything is indeed a bigger deal when it’s family—including one’s pleasure in a successful result. Says Glazer: “I can’t think of anything I would change.”