HOUSE TOUR - A Maximalist, Art-Filled Pied-à-Terre in New Jersey

Hi, Homeworthy. I'm Judy King. Welcome to my pied-à-terre in Princeton, New Jersey. You're watching Homeworthy, where we believe every home has a story. Hi, my name is Judy King. I'm an interior designer in Princeton, New Jersey. Welcome to my home. So, we were downsizing. We've been in Princeton for 30 years and raised my kids here. Just trying to figure out our next move. We had a large home and it was just too much space. So, my husband and I were looking pretty... We wanted to be in town, near the university, because that's where everything's going on and it's happening. So, we looked at this place, which is an estate, which is part of a beautiful park, Marquand Park, which is an arboretum. And I used to walk my kids when they were little here, when we used to live in town, back in the 90s. So, this estate has been here for years and I knew back in the 70s that they made it into condominiums. So, there were like five condos and they hardly ever come on the market. And one happened to come on and we were very excited about it. So, we came over. We looked at it. We didn't think it was going to be around much longer. So, we jumped on it and we love it. I mean, it's small, turnkey. We have a home in the vineyard. So, we travel a lot. We work a lot. So, this is perfect. What drew me to this was the floors, because there are these beautiful parquet floors and the high ceilings. We have these 12-foot high ceilings. So, it just felt very European to me and I used to sell a lot of European antiques and still own a lot. So, I just felt like this was perfect for us and it has a beautiful terrace. We just sort of just updated everything because the bones were here and it's a beautiful place. So, it's really about just the wallpaper and painting and furnishing. So, that's pretty much all we did. I do a lot of collecting. So, I have a lot of like zebra Staffordshire collection. I have a lot of books. I love books. And my style, I think it would be, I mean, for me, it's just all the things that I love to buy. It's a definite mix. It's got contemporary and old and traditional. So, just that whole mix kind of probably makes it more of like a transitional but old world, you know. I mean, definitely European vibe. So, that's what I was going for and that's what I think we accomplished too. So, that's a good thing. Welcome to my living room. This is the main hub of the house. I love this room because of the ceilings and I wanted to accent the ceiling by putting the gold wallpaper. I had the chandelier from my last house in my dining room. So, I wanted to bring it over. It's from Holly Hunt and I love it. So, we've also built these built-ins and painted them black. High gloss black for all my collectibles and, you know, zebras and books and things like that. We didn't do anything with the fireplace. It's all original. I did mirror the back wall and had my artist paint a little Greek key around it just to give it some interest. This is an artist in Trenton, New Jersey. And, you know, they have the Arts Council of Princeton here. And we bought this, gosh, I think I bought this about 15 years ago at one of their art shows. So, I just thought it was amazing. So, we've had this and we decided to put that there and work everything around it. Which is why, you know, all the black and white, obviously, I brought the drapes in with this fabric because of my zebras. And the green striae walls, I just wanted to have green in here. Everything was yellow before when we first moved in. So, I just wanted to get rid of all the yellow, all the moldings and just like a nice clean white. This piece here, which I've had forever, is my office, believe it or not. Everything inside, all my books and my catalogs and samples and everything like that. And this wallpaper is a Schumacher, which is great. So, I just hid the chicken wire with the wallpaper. But everything inside that is, you don't want to know. It's just office stuff. I've just been collecting Staffordshire zebras for years. I had a lot more, but I lost a few in the move. And that's just something I've been doing for years. So, it's like one of my little, you know, when I'm antiquing or going to any kind of flea markets, I'm always looking for little zebras. So, that's why I have so many. I don't really have much of a method. I mean, I do love to stack my books, and then I love to put an object or something on top of it, whether it's books or magazines. So, I do a lot of that, and you'll see. And I bring in pictures, like family photos, all over the place. Well, these pieces here, these are Mugliani's, and they're very valuable pieces of art. So, that was important for me to just stack them there as you leave or come in, so they're noticeable. And this French chest I've had, which I love. But these are just, again, just things that I collect. This lamp was a great guy in New Hope who used to do these beautiful lamps. They no longer are around, but I have a lot of these little lamps, as you'll see, when you go around the apartment. Well, I do mix up the seating. So, sometimes I put the sofa, and I face that to the fireplace, and I put the chairs over there. So, it depends. Like, in the wintertime, I change all this around. But in the summer and in the, you know, spring and fall, it's just more open to have it like this. So, you know, I had this beautiful sofa, so I definitely wanted to use it. It was high. Yeah, and I just think with the flow, you need to be able to get in and out of this. I work in this room, so, like, for me, it was just about functionality, pretty much, and being practical about how I placed everything so that I could really get people in and out and move around. Because when we have a lot of friends and guests and entertain, it's important to keep it open around the fireplace, because we always have fires in the wintertime. This is all original. Yeah, it's so beautiful. I mean, all we did was just clean up the floor and polish it. I mean, it was in perfect shape. They had lots of rugs here, the previous owners. So, I just love these parquet floors. I mean, they're just beautiful. So, that is really the reason that we bought the place, to be honest. Because it's an old building, we couldn't do recessed lights in the ceiling, so the chandelier was obviously a focal point. Lower lighting with the sconces on the built-ins and lamps were really important. We have incredible natural light. After about 1 o'clock, it just floods in. So, I mean, it's really so special when you don't need any of the lights on, actually. You get a lot of great natural light, especially with the terrace and everything. A lot of these things I've had, I had this red lacquer coffee table, so that just kind of sits on its own. I don't know, I just kind of bring everything together. I mean, it's not like matchy-matchy, which I don't like anyway, but it's just textures and pieces that I love. And that's kind of how it all, and it all just kind of works. We definitely needed outdoor space, and it's nice. It's like 15 by 35 feet. It's a beautiful terrace. And again, it kind of overlooks these huge trees that are part of, a lot of them are just incredible. So, we've put the planters in, but these benches were here. They were custom-made by the previous owners. So, we just painted them gray, put new cushions and pillows. But basically, this was also here, which was really nice. We just did a built-in in the back to put all sort of like receptacles and trash and things like that in. But we pretty much hang out here. This is kind of our chill area. So, when we entertain, we set this up as a bar. We like to eat out here. So, it's great. I mean, it's a beautiful space. I had this beautiful table from my last home, this garden piece. So, I decided to have something when you're in the living room, you can see a beautiful arrangement or round table. So, this is sort of one section. And then under the awning, we did the whole seating area, which works out nice because it gets very hot here. So, having the awning, getting away from the heat and the sun is good. So, then the third section is where we eat. If we come outside, that's the library door. So, we can come out here from the kitchen and we can eat here. And it works out really nice. And we can set up that as a buffet as well. So, and you can fit a lot of people here because you have the benches. We have the seating here. We got chairs here. So, even in the wintertime, we put heaters out here. And all, like Christmas, we had a big Christmas party. So, we heated it up, keep the two doors open. So, it's a great little flow through. You can go into the living room and then into the library, closing off the kitchen if you have it being catered. So, it's kind of really nice that you have a flow. This is just, it's like an extra room for us for the apartment. So, it works out really well. Welcome to the entry of my home. I guess the entry, which is what I love the most about this house, is they have all these architectural elements that are beautiful. We have this dome on the ceiling, which is actually made of glass, believe it or not. I had this star fixture. So, we thought that would be beautiful just because the dome, the star, and, again, that color, bringing the color in from the living room as well. It's all hand-painted. This is a hand-painted mural that I had my artist do, which I kind of was struggling on what to do in here, whether a mural wallpaper. But then I just decided to have my guy paint a mural. Very subtle with the leaves and just tone on tone. And because the floor, again, black and white, we decided to do something that really pops when you walk in. So, I had him paint our floor, which I love. And then my art and a couple pieces. So, yeah, I mean, this is a pretty small entrance, but we love it. This is an heirloom piece, antique chest from my family. And I love it. It's, you know, beautiful burl wood. The mirror is a lot of these things are pieces that were in my old house. So, just kind of bringing them in here and making them work really worked. Because, I mean, I just love having things that I've cherished for years and years and years. And so, it was really nice that they could fit, which is great. This is like an old Biedermeier piece that I've had forever. It was the first piece I bought when I was very young. And I keep bringing it everywhere with me because I love it. I have an attachment to it. Again, this is the guy from New Hope with his lamps, which are so beautiful. And I've had these coin frames for a long time. I just love bringing, you know, different pieces and artifacts that I can add into my thing, I guess. I don't like my look. And again, stacking books. I'm all about stacking books and putting objects on them. So, this is a beautiful sculpture that I love and I collect. Well, I grew up one of five, and my mother was an interior designer. So, she was in Philadelphia. She did a lot of work in Wilmington and Washington, D.C. So, I always loved that whole creative side of what she was doing. And she was a big collector, a big art dealer, and I just kind of got drawn into that. So, for me, it was kind of a natural transition, you know, as I got older. My other sisters went into different, you know, careers. But for me, it was always about kind of working. I worked with her for ten years in Philadelphia. And then from there, I started my own business in Princeton. And yeah, I took it from there. But yeah, she taught me everything I knew. The experience was great. So, I always knew that I was going to go into this business for sure. Well, I always, you know, I always say, like, first impressions are lasting. So, like, for me, when you're walking into someone's home, I think that is the most important thing. Because, you know, whether it's painted floors or, you know, a mural on the walls or a beautiful sculpture or just, you know, an incredible light fixture, I think that is kind of the key to me. Welcome to my very small kitchen. This is just perfect for my husband and I. Because, again, we like to cook a lot, but we're, you know, in and out a lot, too. So, what I decided to do in this kitchen, because it was all white, was just to paint and high gloss all the cabinets and do this beautiful Scalamandre paper in the panels. And just to add some more judge and just like the rest of the apartment, just maximalism. So, the color of these cabinets are, it's a Farrow & Ball color, Studio Green. And now they have these high gloss kind of lacquer colors that you can, well, the colors, but the finishes now with Farrow & Ball. So, I just decided to go green because we had the green in the living room and I wanted the transition to go into the library with just making sure that it all worked because it's a small space. And it did. And this backsplash actually was here. So, we were working with the marble backsplash as well. So, anyway, this is the kitchen and it works for us. So, that's good. I keep showing you my little lamps because they're from my guy in New Hope that's no longer there. But this is, you know, because of a Princeton tiger, this is a little Princeton. I just love to, you know, bring in lower lighting and paintings on my counter. So, this is the library, which also can be a pullout for guests, like in case one of my kids comes to visit and we can put them in here. But my husband, this is more or less his room. He's a musician, so I've got the guitars up there, all these guitars that he's collected. He plays guitar like every day. So, he's got all his guitars. He reads a lot about different, you know, musicians. And this is basically his room. We usually have this all set up with his computers because he works from here. But I just, again, brought all my books in, added some pictures and candles and flowers. But this is a, you know, small but comfortable. We hang out in here after dinner. We just totally cozy up, watch TV. This is what this room is all about. And again, all my art from like everywhere. So, these built-ins were all here, which was nice. So, we just, I wanted this room to be gold. And I had this rug, which I love. So, we pulled the gold off of this, had my guy paint, did the red ceiling just to give it some oomph. And all our collection of art, some travel art, which is photographs from Ireland that we travel to. And, you know, I mean, I had this piece that I bought years ago, which I love. And that sort of set the tone. We did a grass cloth with Philip Jeffries glass on the back. It was a friend of mine who passed away. And he was a very funky artist. So, it was probably a game board. And then he did a lot of this gold leafing etching on the glass, which is super cool. My husband's parents used to entertain a lot of artists from Latin America. And so, some of these pieces are theirs or he has inherited. This is a great piece of Manhattan painted in the 60s. Don't bump into yourself in here. It's definitely great. The previous owners, I think they had a friend. I was told that Seward Johnson lived here for a short period of time, who was a sculptor. And he did this whole thing. He mirrored everything. I mean, even this is like, you know, your little medicine cabinet. So, everything is mirrored. And as an homage, we are keeping it mirrored because I think it's so cool. So, this was done back in the original time in the 70s. So, it is great. I mean, a lot of people like it. So, instead of having a crazy wallpaper, we just have all mirrors. So, you get to look at yourself. So, it's good. So, we love the bedroom. It overlooks the formal garden, which is part of Guernsey Hall. It's such a beautiful day. And I get to look at this gorgeous fountain. And it's beautiful. And the bedroom, it sort of all started with this mirror, I think. Because I bought this mirror first. And then I decided, you know what? I'm just going to kind of key off the colors and just keep it very serene and soft. Again, it's sort of like a lot of things that I had in my previous house. Although I did buy a new bed in here. Because of the high ceilings, we thought we'd just do like a really great four-poster. And I always have it made up because I love my bedding. It's matouche, which is great. These are a collection of papier-mâché that I bought at an antique store in Palm Beach that I love from my travels. Casa Gusta. And the art is just all personal art that I've collected over the years. So, it's, you know, pretty meaningful because I got rid of a lot of my pictures and kept the most important ones that I like. And I clutter a lot with my photos and keeping things light with my little Swedish dresser. So, as you can see, I keep everything out. My jewelry is out. My purses are out. But I do hide my clothes in my shoes. So, it's all good. I knew because of the high ceilings that I wanted to have a collection of something. And it did take a while for me to find the papier-mâché pieces up there. So, I knew I wanted something straight across that made sense and just to give it height. And that's another reason I sort of, like, hung everything a little higher because of the height. And I just love accenting all the height in this apartment. So, the tapestry was something I bought at an auction and then just had it framed, just stretched. And that, again, brought sort of that closet some height. So, yeah, I think it's really about the height when I was hanging all my art. And special pieces that I love above my bed. Yes, that's a Picasso, which is a limited edition, which is beautiful. I've had that forever. And I, you know, I don't know. I kind of, I love all my little pieces of art. This is the common area to Guernsey Hall. So, it is, these are the apartments, as you can see. And this is all original. They had an artist from Italy come in way back when they renovated the place. I think it was in 1970, 1973. And it's just beautiful. I mean, it's beautiful to be able to come home and walk up these stairs and go into the apartment. And this gorgeous ceiling, you can't even, I mean, you've got to hit the ceiling because it's spectacular. Home is just, for me, it's all about comfort. And it's about being around my family, being in a safe space. I mean, I travel a lot with my clients in Florida. Like, coming home is just, it's just great because I can relax and I can just be me, you know. I feel like, you know, when you're running around a lot, I think home means more and more as you get older. Because it's just your comfort space, your safe space, you know. So, that's sort of what home means to me. See you later, Homeworthy. Thanks for stopping by. Thanks for watching. Be sure to go to homeworthy.com for exclusive content, shopping guides, and so much more.