CHRISTMAS HOME TOUR | RHONJ Star Margaret Josephs’ Maximalist Home Decked Out for Christmas

Hi, Homeworthy. Welcome to my home. It's Margaret Josephs. Come on in. You're watching Homeworthy, where we believe every home has a story. Hi, Homeworthy. I'm Margaret Josephs. Welcome to my home in New Jersey. I'm hosting a Christmas brunch, and I want you to see how I decorated for the holidays. You guys might know me from the Housewives of New Jersey, but I'm an entrepreneur, an author, a mother, a wife, and a fabulous entertainer. My husband, Joe, told me, Marge, go find a house. And he knew that I was not going to look for new construction. I like charm. I like history, and I always wanted to move on to the street because I loved the old homes in this historic neighborhood. And when I drove past this old Tudor that had magnificent big windows, which is very rare for a Tudor, I said, I have to have that house. And I walked in, and I was overwhelmed with emotion. It was so beautiful. And I walked in to this room, which I call the ballroom. It was so big. The windows were magnificent, floor to ceiling. They were doors. And all I thought was, oh my god, the parties that must have happened here. Just for this room alone, I have to have this house. The fireplace wall was magnificent. And the people that lived here were 92 years old, and they had lived here for 50-plus years. And they were telling me the stories, the parties they would host. She wrote films, and she wrote plays, and she would host these magnificent galas and have the producer of the Beatles in the home. And she would have all these great events, and she was a gymnast, and she was glamorous. And when I went into their closet, everything was meticulously folded, and I just saw they had such pride in this home. It just was so beautiful. And I said to Joe, I have to have this house, and I don't care. What would you do? And we knew it would be a lot of work and undertaking, but I said, I can make it grand, and I can have respect for what it was. I don't want to rip it all out and renovate. I want to restore it to its old glamour, old Hollywood, and just have respect for it. So I said, I'm going to name it the Tudor Club, because it will always be a club for entertaining all of my friends, and I want to pass it down for generations to our kids. And that's the way our kids feel about it. They're just like, we're going to have this home forever for our kids, and I just love that they feel about it the way that I do. Welcome to the front entry of the Tudor Club, which I lovingly call the lobby, because I want the Tudor Club to feel like a boutique-y hotel, very vintage-y. And it is pretty grand when you walk in, because the windows are so big. And I wanted to make a statement when you come into the home. I love a wallpaper. I love everything printed. So of course, it had to be a Missoni, which I think looks so fabulous in the entryway. Who doesn't love a Missoni? And the artwork, which I want to speak to, was gifted to me by my neighbor Michelle Rosenfeld. She thought it would look so great here, and it does. She is an amazing art dealer, very famous, who actually discovered Basquiat. And she likes to tell me that. She lives around the corner. She has Picassos. She has everything. And she's like, Marge, I'm going to give you this Willie Heeks. He didn't become as famous as I would have liked, but it's still worth a decent amount of money. I was like, you know what? I'll take it. I also want to just say one other thing. If you notice my staircase, this was another reason I bought the home, because this staircase obviously is not from 1906. The former owners who lived here, the Powers, put this staircase in, and I just love it so much. It's really a piece of art. I never refinished it. People are like, why don't you paint it black? Why don't you do this? I just can't. I cannot change this piece that they put in here. But it's been in here so long, it was sagging. It was so heavy that Joe had to put a pole, a brass pole, to hold it up that goes all the way into the basement. So this is not a stripper pole. I just want to clarify that. So of course, the lobby in any hotel always has a Christmas tree. We're talking about the holiday decor, and I thought it should be glimmery and Hollywood-like. So I have a gold tinsel Christmas tree with gorgeous bronze ornaments, and it has to have organic pieces in it as well. So we mix in pine cones, and I just want to say we decorated, but I have my landscape architect, Paul Keyes, who is meticulous. I cannot work with anybody else who had designed all the landscaping on the house where he did it all, and he comes and does my holiday decor with me, and he's like, Marge, we have to make it sophisticated, glamorous, fabulous. So he did the banister for us and helped me because this is a lot of house, and I don't always like to ruin my nails. So we did such a fabulous job, and I have all my gifts wrapped and matching them, and we have a lot of trees through the house, which I'd love to show you. Okay, I'm going to take you to the room that made me fall in love with this house, the ballroom. Isn't this fabulous? When I came into the house and saw this room, I was mesmerized. I could not believe the size of it, the feel of it. Now, it didn't look exactly like this, but she told me, the previous owners, that this was their room for entertaining, and she just loved it, and it was so fabulous when I saw it. She had all different conversation areas. She also had a bar. It was just so fun, and all I thought was, wow, look at the history. I imagine the parties that took place, the memories that were made, the entertaining that happened, and I just was like, I'm going to replicate this. I want to live like this. I want to have these grand parties and make these memories so that the next person who has this house 100 years from now says, wow, Margaret Joseph threw these amazing parties here, and I want to do that too. So let me show you all the special features of this room. These are the original cherry floors. We did not change the floors. These high heel marks are memories that were made from the previous owners and from me dancing on these floors. Now, they weren't black when I got the house. They were dark brown, but I hear the joints, these butterfly joints, if you could see them, those really aren't common now when you put hardwood floors in, but these are historical little joints, and I just wanted to keep that in there. I wasn't going to fill in all the little holes and all the little marks because that would take away from the history of the home, and Joe was like, you're not going to get rid of cherry floors, Marge, and he was right. It's just the memory of everything. The other amazing thing about this room was this original fireplace wall, all the molding, all the detail, the limestone fireplace. This was just unbelievable. Now, it wasn't high gloss black. It was really the color of dead mice, so I said, I don't want to get rid of it. I love all the molding. I think it's so magnificent, but let's just paint it black so it really highlights the features and the detail of everything. Now, most people would have said, let's do marble around the fireplace, but I said, no, keep the old limestone. I love it, and I really think it works within the house. I wanted to pay homage to the history of this home. It was more of a restoration, and I felt the love for it, and no one else is going to have this. It's so beautiful. It's from 1906, and I think when you have new construction, which I love, and so many people love new construction, it doesn't have the character and the history and the memories and the charm of an older home. An old home has a soul that you just can't duplicate, and that's what I love about it, and whenever my husband complains, ugh, the old house. I said, I have an old husband. Do you want me to get rid of you? Can't argue with that, and there's also a little hidden gem that we found when we came into the which I actually did not see when we were going through the home to buy it. There's a little hidden room behind the fireplace where you could keep your secrets. I keep my Christmas decor and the packages that I hide from my husband, Joe, when I don't want him to know that I've been shopping, or I hide the Christmas gifts, so let me tell you about the pieces that I put in this room to update it. First, I got a piano. This room called for a piano. I don't play the piano, but I need a baby grand piano, so I got this baby grand piano. I got it at the Armory in New York City. They were getting rid of it, and it was actually, I got it for free. I just had to pay for the delivery here, so when people come over, we sing karaoke around it. We have sing-alongs, and maybe eventually I'll learn to play the piano, but you know, in my spare time. If not, maybe I'll turn into a player piano. We'll see, but it's so great. We do a lot of time shining it, not playing it as much as we should, but it's a great statement piece. The other piece I love so much, and an investment that most people complain about but is so important, is a fabulous sofa. This sectional piece I bought years ago from my old home. It was from Lee, I believe, a custom sofa, and I've reupholstered it, and I love maximalist style, mixing prints, and this is from Emma J. Shipley, The Prince. I'd reupholster it, but the size and scale of it is important in a room this size, but also I wanted it to fit a lot of people. We love to cuddle up, watch movies in this house. It's so important that your sofa couch is very comfortable, so you could just really relax and enjoy it. A room like this might look fancy, but it's really the space that everybody gathers, and we want to make it livable and cozy and feel good, so that's why this sofa, I just love it so much. Also, I just want to say, I don't know if people say this a lot, I don't love a fully down sofa. I like my cushions wrapped and down, because if it's totally down, it gets too squishy, so these pillows are down, and these aren't, and also, the Emma J. Shipley fabric wipes off very easily. My dog has thrown up on the sofa numerous times, and it cleans up very easily. That's a big thing with me, because we entertain so much, everything has to be very durable, because we really use the house. Now, for the wallpaper. This wall was so vast. Paint? No way. Wouldn't do it justice. I said to Joe, we need some kind of mural-type wallpaper, and I love wallpaper, so I found this on Rebel Walls. Again, not crazy expensive. I gave them the dimensions, and I thought it coordinated very nicely with the sofa fabric. Black and white, fabulous animals, and Joe put it up. He did a great job putting up the wallpaper, but I want to show you the one detail that people don't realize. The outlet covers. A lot of people cover their outlets with wallpaper, and then you see the seams. Joe actually hand-drew, with a Sharpie, every outlet cover to match the wallpaper. One day, I walked in the ballroom. I was like, Joe, what are you doing? He's sitting here with a Sharpie, and he's like, I'm drawing in the pattern on the outlet covers, and he is such a great artist that he matched all the wallpaper perfectly. I was like, he's unbelievable. I mean, his nickname is the real Super Joe. I have a quick, very funny story that I normally don't share. It's housewifey. This was kind of a hand-me-down from another housewife. You might know her, Danielle Staub. She lived nearby. She was getting divorced. Her husband was having a tremendous estate sale. Now, I would never show up there, but my realtor did and said, they're selling everything, and this soap is only $300. I said, I have to have it. It's a great piece, and I'll reupholster it. No one will ever recognize it. Well, of course, when they filmed the show, she recognized it, had a lot to say about it, but I can't resist a bargain, no matter where it's been. So, this was actually a hand-me-down from one of my enemies. What can I say? You know what? I had to have it. So, let me tell you about the lighting. I chose a lot of different type of lighting in the house, and some people think it should coordinate better, whatever, but I think this lighting actually works. All the lighting has brass detail to tie it together, but I thought this is great mood lighting. It's like a gold crackled glass, and it hangs over the sofa so beautifully. It hangs low, but we never hit our head because we don't stand on the sofa, and it's nice lighting. If that's the only light on in the room, it makes your skin glow and look beautiful. I'm all about dimmers, proper lighting, not too bright. I mean, the most beautiful people could look horrible in the wrong lighting. So, this lighting gives off the perfect hue, so you look great, and I just thought the lights were so beautiful, so I had to have those. But then, follow me over to the bar. I have different lighting that reminds me of a hotel lobby bar, which, you know, this is the Tudor Club. These lights also set the tone for a great time, and I'll turn this light on for you. This light is so beautiful, and you could also dim it, and I think it just looks fabulous while you're sitting here having your drink. And since I have a full stock bar, and everybody comes here to party, and when I'm entertaining, everyone wants a drink, a cocktail. I happen not to drink, and it's funny that I have a bar. It was so important to me. I have a mocktail called Soiree. That's why I created it, and actually, Joma supported one for me, so I'm going to have a little drink of Soiree right now. So good. I've been talking so much, I need a little sip. This is where we throw all of our parties, our holiday party, everything that goes on. This is where the dancing happens, and this is where we open up all our holiday presents, so I want you to see my Christmas tree that Lexi and I decorated. It's done in black and white because it goes well in the room. I love a statement tree. Our tree is flocked. It's great. We have beautiful bows on it, so Lexi and I always are like, more is more, and we put all different kinds of ornaments. We have disco balls tucked in the tree. We have shiny ornaments, matte ornaments, glitter printed, but all in black and white and silver because that was the theme, and I didn't want to mix in any color, but the only ornaments that are different are my Caviar Dreams tuna fish budget because that's what I've said since I'm a little girl. I always said I have Caviar Dreams and tuna fish budget. I didn't grow up with any money or anything like that, so here's my little Caviar ornament. Here's my little tuna fish, and I just love that so much, these little ornaments, and it always reminds me of what I say, and I wrote a book, Caviar Dreams Tuna Fish Budget. It's been a common theme in my life, and let me tell you, I still operate on a tuna fish budget. I'm pretty thrifty. All the gifts under the tree are beautifully wrapped. They are done by a professional named Marge Senior, my mother, who is the best gift wrapper ever since I was a little girl. She would wrap everything like it came out of a store window. She is a meticulous wrapper, does the bows perfectly. She is so anal about it. I am not allowed to touch one Christmas gift, so I'm so blessed that she comes over and wraps all my gifts for me. I wouldn't have it any other way. She is so good at it, so she made every holiday so perfect growing up. I would wake up on a Christmas morning with perfectly wrapped gifts. She's done it for my kids, and now she still does it for me, so I just give her the gifts, she wraps them, and we're done, but she really makes it look so perfect. She really should work for a store. I mean, look at this. These gifts are meticulous. I could never do them so great. It's fabulous. I have a few other great pieces in this room that I've picked up at estate sales. This mirror is so fabulous. It's so grand, so big. You need a big place to put it, and Joe and I went to an estate sale, actually an old home around the corner, and I saw this mirror. I literally stood in front of it like this. No one touched it. I didn't want anybody else to have it, and other people were trying to bid it up, and I was like, no, it's mine. I had to have it. Now, getting it home was a whole other story. I had to hire a trucking company and the whole nine yards, but it came from another old home in Englewood, and it just worked. It had to be here. Estate sales are the places you find the most unique pieces, something you can make your own, something no one else can have, something that is a little piece of history, and it always makes me think, what did this mirror see? Who stood in front of this mirror? I have so many things that I think about like that. If I drink from an old tea cup, who drank from this cup before? So, I love this old mirror. Also, it's surrounded by my old Hollywood photos, and I love black and white photography. It always speaks to me. I love to look at photographs, old photographs. We have Sophia Loren here with Jane Mansfield, and that's a great one. It's called Hanging Out in Hollywood. I love that picture, and we have Marilyn Monroe, and then I have 1970s photos of Fleetwood Mac. That's one of my favorite groups ever, and I grew up in the 70s, so it reminds me of my childhood. We have James Dean, and I just love the old Hollywood pictures. I even have a picture of my ex-husband, Jan, who passed away, and this wall is just an homage to everything old and magical that has gone on in my life and in the world, and it brings up the history of a house, and it belongs in this home, an old home with a soul, and these are people who have a soul and who have been around history, and it's amazing, and that's what it means a lot to me. Growing up, I grew up very Hungarian, and my mother is a Hungarian immigrant. I am first generation. I grew up with my grandparents, and it was a very European Christmas, and when I say European Christmas, we would have a big pig roast, and we would actually go on a pig hunt. Could you imagine me, little Marge, going on a pig hunt? I mean, maybe that's where I got my pigtails from, but my grandfather would go on a pig hunt, and we'd have a tremendous pig roast, and it was just magical. All our cousins would come over. My grandfather would do this big pig roast. Everybody would eat, and it would be just so festive, and my grandmother would make these beautiful strudels. It was called Alma strudel, reattach, actually, Alma reattach, and in Hungarian, it was just so nice, and it really made me appreciate the holidays. Now, my mother and I, unfortunately, are not rolling strudel anymore, but I would love to bring back that tradition, so I think I'm going to have a little chat with Marge Sr. about that, and I don't think I could be chasing a pig around a pig pen to do the pig roast, but I do still wear the pigtails. What I love most about the holiday season is the entertaining that I do on Christmas, because we do work so hard all year round, be it filming, be it traveling for my business, that I get to be with my family and friends, so I host an annual brunch on Christmas morning. People sleep over the night before. My son's friends sleep over, so I wake up in the morning. I make my French toast casserole. I have food all spread out for everyone, and we could just talk about the evening before when we watched a family movie and just spend time together, and then we go on to prepare for our big Christmas gala on Christmas night. We have a hundred people over, and I just so look forward to it because I get to spend time with everyone I love. We get to celebrate. It's the end of the year. The house is decorated. It's filled with love. We make new memories, and I just want to say this has been going on for years, even with my ex-husband. I have been doing this party literally forever and two faces ago. I just showed you my ballroom, so let me take you into my dining room, which is right up the lobby of the house, and I have people about to show up for brunch, so let's check it out. Now, this is a very important room because eating is the mainstay of our family. We love to eat in the dining room. It's not just for special occasions. A lot of people always don't want it. Don't touch the dining room. Don't touch the dining room. We always eat in the dining room, but now I have it set up for the holiday, my Christmas brunch, and I just love this room so much. It's so special to me because the table holds such a dear memory to me. It's so important. It's our family heirloom because I wanted a live-edge table, and this live-edge table was very, very expensive, but I wasn't allowed to buy it because my husband Joe was like, Marge, under no circumstances are you getting that table. I'm going to make you one. I said, you're going to make me one? That's his love language, doing things for me, so I was like, okay, Joe, make me a table. So, lo and behold, Joe Benigno took me to go make a table. He took me to the lumberyard. He had me pick out a slab of wood. I'm talking about you. Could you hear me? Yeah, I did. Was it bad or good? I said, your love language is making me things. Yes. According to you, yes. The more I make, the more you like it. Well, I feel like it's the more you love me. I do love you. So, I said, you made this table for me. It's our family heirloom because you said, under no circumstance, buy this table. Oh, no. They were terrible compared to what I could make you. Exactly. So, Joe made me this table. It has lucite legs. It's so beautiful, and it's our family heirloom. We love it so much, right? It's moved from house to house with us. That's right, and it's not light to move. No, it's not light to move, and I love it. So, it's had all different chairs around it. So, now, we just updated it with these pink chairs. I love color, and I feel like because we could see the Missoni wallpaper, and real men wear pink. I upholstered them with this beautiful linen fabric. I got the chairs actually on Wayfair, but I wanted to make them my own, and I upholstered them in a beautiful fabric with a jewel-toed green cording, and we made them our own, and I love a swivel chair, so I could swivel around, speak to everybody, and I thought it really made the dining room look fantastic, but what really makes the dining room look fantastic during the holidays is the tablescaping, and I'm so blessed to have talented friends. Oh, my God. I know, right? Crazy. We called Joanna Buchanan, who I'm so blessed to be good friends with. She has the most gorgeous table decor. She has napkin rings, napkins, the Capiz Christmas trees, and we've done things together for years. I have all her pieces in my home. They're like jewelry for the table. They're so magnificent. She's done a piece on Homeworthy as well. When you see her items, you will go absolutely crazy, and she wanted to bring in the pink and the green of it all, and actually, the flowers and everything are done by my landscape architect, Paul Keyes, who just loves the home so much, and he loves to bring in an organic feel. He's done some pine cones. He put all the greenery together. We have apples in here. He's gilded some pears, and I just think it really works in the house. It's mixing the organic with the fun with the modern, but there is some other heirlooms on this table as well. The plates, if you look at them, are from my childhood. They're my grandmother's china, and we would eat on these just for special occasions. These were my grandmother's Christmas plates. They are very old. They're European. Unfortunately, some broke, so I had to dig them down on eBay, but I love them so much, and I love that my grandmother had the best style enough to get... They were black, and I have so much black in my home, and there's green, and it's a beautiful scene, and I just love it so much, and she coveted these because my grandparents did not have money. They were immigrants from Hungary, and she always loved fine dishes. She had beautiful dishes, and they were only used on special occasions, but I make everything a special occasion, so I love to use them, and especially on Christmas to remind me of my childhood. This buffet that I got at Restoration Hardware. It's burl wood. I love burl wood, and I thought it goes nicely with the table, so I got this at Restoration Hardware, but of course, it was too low to the ground. What happened, Joe? Marge went and bought some brass balls, and I made the adapters, and I picked up this table set, and it weighed like 300 freaking pounds, and I screwed the legs on the bottom. I know. Joe has to make everything personalized for me. You know, if you find a piece that you love, but it doesn't quite work, you could always make it work somehow. If it's too short, you can add feet. If you don't like the handles, change the hardware. If it's not the right color, paint it. If it has all the right details, you can make something work because you could always call Joe, and these gray melons spoke to me. It's from his Born Voyage collection, and I love to travel, and these are all taken looking out the airplane window, and I just love them. It's like Elton John with his sunglasses. It's an homage to him, and I love Elton John, Tiny Dancer, my favorite song ever. This is like a glamour puss looking outside, cheersing. She's going on holiday. That would be me, cheersing with a mocktail, and this is Willy Wonka. I love chocolate with their golden ticket, so I just thought these worked so well. The colors work in the house, and they speak to me, so when you're doing your artwork, make sure it speaks to you. It doesn't have to be expensive, but that you really feel the love for it. Okay, I want to take you to the library next. This room is right off the lobby, and I love it. It's like cozy, dark, sexy. People love to come in here and just sit. I didn't put a television in here. It's really just to relax, read, rejuvenate yourself, and of course, I still have to decorate it for the holidays, but I said, what's the cutest way to put a little tree in here? All my books, Caviar Dreams, Tuna Fish Budget, we did a little book tree, which we thought was so adorable. It looks great. Just throw a little black bow on it. I think that's a great holiday decor idea, don't you? A little book tree. We even put some ribbons on our artwork, which I thought looked fabulous. We have a great fireplace. We decorated the mantle, but again, all old Hollywood glimmery, and make it really cute and sexy. A nice dark room. People love to come in here, have a drink at night, a nice little hot toddy. Of course, since I don't drink, I either have a hot apple cider, and Joe and I just like to come in here, sit, catch up, but this room really is such a nice little room. It just makes you feel so warm and cozy. It's just fabulous, but I love to decorate every room on our main level, because a little touch of Christmas everywhere just makes you feel so great. These are the original bookshelves. I didn't want to get rid of them. I just updated them with a wallpaper on the back, and Joe and I painted the shelves. That's exactly what we did. The house had all these bookshelves, and I thought they were great. I was like, why would I change them? They look fabulous, and I just gave them a little update. Oh, and I just want to say, these books, I grew up with these books. These were from Marge Senior. She wanted to buy me first edition books, all leather-bound, and we saved them until I got a library that I could put them in. I thought they were so great. I was like, Marge Senior, I finally have a library. Hand those books over. I was just so happy to have them. I mix my different styles together, and I am a Jersey girl, so we always need a little leopard. You always need leopard in your house. It's a neutral. Leopard is a neutral, and I always say that. We love to play games. We play chess here. My son totally beats me all the time. It's so great, but interior design is meant to be fun and show your personality. Nothing annoys me more than going to someone's house, and it looks like a showroom. You don't know who lives there. When you walk into someone's house, and it doesn't have their personality, I'm like, ah, get me out. When you come into this house, you know it's my house. Here's proof. Look at my pillows. I have the Jonathan Adler needle points, and then, of course, I have this pillow. Not my circus, not my monkeys, because this house is a circus. So when someone gifted this to me, I was so happy. I was like, this says it all. I want you to see my extremely girly pink office. I love this room. It cheers everybody up. It's the brightest room in the house, so if you thought you saw color now, wait till you really see it. So this room is where the magic happens. This is where I do all my creative work. Lexi and I work together all day designing, working on soiree projects. I do all my interviews in here. You've seen this room filmed on the show on Housewives. So this room is one of my favorite rooms in the house. You cannot be in a bad mood if you are in the pink palm Barbie room that I work in. It is so fabulous, and of course, I also had to decorate for the holidays. It has a pink Christmas tree, pinked out to the max with soiree gifts under it, Jonathan Adler gifts, but I've had all these ornaments for years, just so you know. I've always been obsessed with pink. Nothing on this tree is new, so Lexi and I decorated it to the hilt, and it just makes us feel good. I mean, I want to leave it up all year round. I love it so, so much. It's just so phenomenal. Everybody needs a pink tree in their life. You will never be in a bad mood, I promise you. It just makes everything great. I also just want to talk about the wallpaper and what inspired me to put up this wallpaper, this pink palm leaf wallpaper. I love the Beverly Hills Hotel. Again, an old Hollywood staple, but their palm leaf is green, and I said, I need the pink version. It's from Tevo. I loved it so much, and I said, I just have to saturate the room in it. I even got the fabric. I reupholstered my chairs in the Tevo wallpaper fabric in the print. I'm big about repurposing. I love a reupholster. Who doesn't love a reupholster? Make something old, make it new again. So I had these big chairs. They actually were black patent leather from my old house, and then I just reupholstered them in this beautiful Tevo fabric, and it makes the room look so great. This is what they used to do a long time ago, the same fabric, the same wallpaper, the same drapery. So I was like, that's Marge, vintage Marge. So I said in this room, that's what I'm doing. Now, let me show you one of my favorite pieces in the house. It's from Parker Kennedy, my Barbie wreath. Look at this Barbie wreath. It is so me. It's so amazing. It says Queen. It says Marge and Joe. I just love it so much. It was custom made for me. And the way I found out about this wreath is I was at Patricia Atschel's house from Charleston. She's on Southern Charm. Her house is magnificent. And I went in there and she had a Barbie wreath. I was like, where did you get that? She has this lovely duo made for me, Parker and Kennedy. And I said, I must contact them immediately. And I wrote to them and said, I love the wreath you made for Patricia. Can I please get one from you? I'd love to purchase one. And they sent this to me as a gift, which is so beautiful. It's just so me. All the blonde Barbies. It's really the most magnificent piece of art that I just love it so much. And then they made me another thing, homage to the Marge with all their vintage ornaments as well. This is Marge's power pony look that I've gotten known for. They made this silhouette of me. They also sent this to me, which is so fabulous. So I have all this Barbie artwork. I also have beautiful vintage Barbie prints that I keep near my desk, which I'd love to show you. I mean, Barbie is everything I played with and wanted to be and grow up to be when I was a little girl. So these gorgeous vintage Barbie prints that I have framed as well. Like I said, my artwork speaks to me and this room just calls for Barbie, Barbie, Barbie, Barbie. I mean, here's me even in a little Barbie photo from when the movie came out. You know, blonde, you know, I'm a little older than, well, Barbie in real life is older than me, truthfully. Barbie's been around forever, but she stays forever young. She's had really good work. Me, only two facelifts. I also just want to mention this, this table. This table is an heirloom to this house. The prior owners, as I said, used to write plays and was in the theater and she used to write her plays on this table and she left it for us when she moved out. She was 91 years old and Lexi and I use it as our desk every day and I love it so much. This marble table is so beautiful. So we kept it. We got orange Mac computers to put on top of it and we just sit here and we get to look out into the room and we feel great. We get to look outside the beautiful windows. We work next door to each other, side by side. I could look at her screen as we design and it's just, it's a great time. We're very blessed that I get to work from home in this beautiful atmosphere, in this feel good room and be creative in such a wonderful space. As I'm sitting here drinking my iced coffee out of a wine glass, I get to go into another fabulous gift. My Coffee Mate refrigerator. Marge's Coffee Mate stash. It took a while for Coffee Mate to notice me. I'm not going to lie. I'd be drinking my Coffee Mate constantly and then they finally said, Marge, we love you so much. We're gifting you a refrigerator filled to the brim with Coffee Mate. I don't know about you guys, but I love a coffee creamer. All different flavors. Now I'm running low on the Coffee Mate. My regular refrigerator is filled up, but so is this one. I have my Italian sweet cream. I got the coconut. I got the mocha. Right now I'm really loving the Kit Kat. I have my main refrigerator, but I have to keep it right close by because I literally drink iced coffee and coffee all day long. That's what keeps me going. That's my energy because, you know, there's a lot of house. I got a lot of work to do. Keep it moving. Okay, let me show you my powder room. I love it so much. Okay, even my powder room is maximalist. Now, if you're afraid of doing maximalist style, the powder room is the best way to dip a toe in because it's a small space and you can give it a wow factor with not breaking the budget. And if you make a mistake, it's easy to redo. But I always love to have a grand, fabulous powder room. No matter who comes in here, they're going to be wowed. I have snakeskin wallpaper. Don't be afraid to put artwork in here. I have Elton John. I have an original VIP ticket from Andy Warhol from Studio 54. I put up beautiful sconces. I have marble. You could really be decadent in your powder room for not a lot of money. And people, everybody uses your powder room. So everyone sees it. Sometimes I just come in here. I do my makeup in here. So it's really great. I even decorate a little bit for the holidays in the powder room because people will be coming here for Christmas and they want to feel a little special, a little holiday, a little sparkle. I keep coffee table books. Oh, I didn't even mention to you guys. I have coffee table books everywhere. I don't know if you noticed when you're coming around the house. I love books, little coffee table books everywhere throughout the house because who doesn't read when they're in the bathroom? You know what I'm saying? And my favorite hand soap is Ortizia Sicily. It's my favorite hand soap to ever use. And I don't always get a soap dispenser. So this is actually kind of pretty. So if you guys ever want to order it, just order it because it's amazing. I host so many parties and I have so many tips to host a great party. And the first thing is, it's about the people that attend the party. And you know, a lot of people don't like to mix their friends. I like an eclectic crowd. I like to mix all different types of people together. And if somebody doesn't have somewhere to go for a holiday, you just invite them. I've actually invited people. I've been at the diner and my server did not have a place to go for the holidays. I just invite them over. It's so great to have a great mix of people. The next thing is, I don't care what food you're serving. Just make it look glamorous. You could be serving McDonald's, serve it on a silver platter. That's what it is. People just want to be together. The next thing is the lighting. No one wants bright lights. You have to have mood lighting. It's to set the mood. Lots of candles, dim lighting. No one looks great in bright light. Oh, horrible. Music. Music is super important. Music is even more important than the food, as far as I'm concerned. Because the music sets the mood for dancing. I always love to end the evening with dancing the whole night away. So it doesn't really even matter about that. I mean, I'm telling you, you could make Chinese food look good. Inexpensive Chinese food, just serve it in a great way and it works. Okay, here is my kitchen, which was a total renovation. Got renovation. It took us forever to do this kitchen. I love it so much. Some people think it's too much. I say, never enough. It is prints mixed with stone and I just love it because it's all tonal and I think it totally works. Contrary to popular belief, I do cook and Christmas morning, I do an amazing brunch and I want to show you what I do because everybody just sleeps over. But first, before we talk about the food, I'm going to talk about the kitchen. When we saw this house originally, which you're going to see the befores, it was split into two. There was a tremendous chimney here with a big pizza oven or something in it that went up three floors. So structurally, we had to take out this chimney and big piece that split the kitchen in two down three floors. It was crazy. We had a blast. We had to do all this stuff. We had to get an engineer in to take it out and it made the kitchen look really small. So it was split in two. This was like a little nook to eat in. Then you had to walk around this big structure, go to the other side. So it took us a long time to figure out how to make the kitchen work. And then when we took it out, we're like, wow, this kitchen's really big. It didn't look so big. And I was like, what was important to me, I was like, let's get a big island so people could gather around. When I entertain, we can make a beautiful buffet. Everyone gathers in the kitchen. It's the heart of the home. But I didn't want an open concept plan in this house. I didn't want to knock down walls going into the dining room. I wanted a separate space. So if I ever want to just close the door off, if I was catering or something like that, it could really work. So of course, we have a beautiful eating space. I love a round table. Everybody could speak to each other. It's and a more modern fixture. And then we have the beautiful island. Now, everywhere else I did marble, but in the kitchen I did porcelain. And though it looks like marble slab, like I said, marble really stains. So I did porcelain because it wipes off easily. I can put hot plates on it. I have a lot of spills. I didn't want it ruined. So a lot of naturalists are like, don't do that. But I was like, I don't need to do real stone in the kitchen. And I think this really looks like stone. It's from Dow tile. I work with them all the time. They did all my marble and they have so many things that look amazing that are quality and durable and just work. So I love it so much. I did it on the back splashes. I did it all over the kitchen. The veining is magnificent and it really holds up and is practical. And I need to be practical when I'm working in the house and are messy. I was like, no, no, I can't do marble in the kitchen. The other thing is it was important to me. Like, you know, I love a print. I've been showing you wallpaper throughout the house. I did again, Tebow wallpaper and the matching curtains, the matching shades. I love to keep it consistent. I made my famous French toast casserole. I have tons of people coming for brunch, not tons, but a few good friends. And let me get out of the oven before it burns. I put up my beautiful spread before we have our big party tonight. Ooh, this looks good. You have to use Balthazar baguettes. It's the best thing to use. And it does not look delicious. By the way, it smells amazing. I'm not going to lie. It's my famous French toast casserole. It's so good. I have to put a little powdered sugar with my Cafe Du Monde powdered sugar dispenser, which I got at Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans. See, I love to travel, pick up all my things, and I will be serving this for when everybody comes over. It's so yummy. It's so sweet and just buttery. And just so you know, Balthazar Bakery headquarters is in our town, and it is so amazing in Englewood. They make all their delectable treats. So let me just show you what we have here. So of course, we have the caviar here. I'm going to steal a little before anybody comes in. Caviar on a potato chip with crème fraîche, the best thing in the entire universe. I'm going to stick a little spoon in, which I got a little crème fraîche on, to die. So we have the sweet, and then we have the salty. I have all different versions of smoked fish. We have the honey smoked fish. We have the pepper smoked salmon. We have all different versions. I have a fabulous quiche Lorraine, all the cheeses, everything from Balthazar Bakery. The bagels with all the spreads. So just a sweet and salty breakfast, because at night, we're going to really be kicking it up with a lot of food. So the morning, we eat like this. It's fabulous. We do a great brunch. We relax on the sofa. And then when night comes, we start all over again and dance the night away. So I'm so excited that everyone's coming over. Home to me means my place of peace, my happiness, where I am with my family, where I could just be my ultimate self, that I get to relax, where I make all my best memories. People think I'm a real party-goer outside. If you look at my social media, you see them at events constantly. But my happiest place is my home. I'm my most creative self. I'm my happiest when I'm just laying around with my family, eating dinner, making my Sunday night chicken in the oven. So home really means to me where my heart is. I could really stay home for weeks on end, and I'd be thrilled. I don't like to actually leave my home, contrary to popular belief. It's also where I work. I work in my home, where I do my creative things. But it's also a form of torture, I'm not going to lie, because then I have to look and see where I have to fix everything. Merry Christmas, everyone. Thank you for coming to my brunch, where you can taste my French toast casserole. It's been a year. I'm so happy that we get to celebrate together. Thank you for coming here. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Cheers. Good family, good friends. We're very blessed. Thanks for watching. Be sure to go to homeworthy.com for exclusive content, shopping guides, and so much more.