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Designer Gabrielle Grawey helped Jonassohn give his new residence an inviting, unique look. (JOHN KENNEY/The Gazette)
Decorating after divorce
When this dad's marriage ended, he moved into a new house and had no idea where to start
Stephanie Whittaker
The Gazette
Monday, August 18, 2008
Designer Gabrielle Grawey helped Jonassohn give his new residence an inviting, unique look. (JOHN KENNEY/The Gazette)
After his marriage ended a year ago, Jody Jonassohn had a key preoccupation: to find a new house that would be a home for his two children.
“I managed to find a six-year-old house that was not far from the family home in Dollard des Ormeaux,” he said, adding that it was desperately in need of a facelift.
“I wanted my children to be comfortable and I didn’t want to change their lifestyle.”
The children had grown up in Dollard and Jonassohn, who shares custody with his ex-wife, wanted his new house to be easily accessible to his son, Jake, 14, and daughter, Jesse, 11.
The other problem Jonassohn was facing was that he didn’t have a clue about how to turn a house into the kind of welcoming, comfortable environment he wanted to give his children. He was starting from scratch, not just with the house but with its contents.
So he turned to Gabrielle Grawey, a home stager and interior designer, who had been referred by a friend. Grawey oversaw the renovation that spruced up the house. She took charge of the purchase of everything from furniture and bedding to dishes and houseplants.
“I knew what I liked when I saw a chair and a couch, but I wouldn’t know how to put it all together,” Jonassohn said.
“I had bought the house because I liked the layout and I knew I could get quick occupancy. But I couldn’t visualize anything. If I were designing it myself, I would have gone to a store that has rooms designed and set up and bought the whole room.”
“When Jody bought the house, it was disorganized and chaotic,” Grawey said. “It was not harmonious.”
But, she added, it had potential so she got to work at transforming it. The first job was to renovate the unfinished basement as a television room for the children. The homey touch, Jonassohn said, came from the movie posters he bought and mounted on the walls.
Once Grawey had a sense of what sort of decor Jonassohn liked, the two shopped together.
“I had a lot of fun buying things,” Jonassohn said. “We would spend afternoons shopping.”
Overall, he wanted an uncluttered look in the house, so Grawey selected furniture sparingly. Jonassohn laughs at the suggestion that his living room is probably every man’s dream. It contains no furniture; the only object in the room is a large billiard table.
“I knew I wouldn’t sit in the living room,” Jonassohn said. “I’d sit in the den instead. So instead of hiding the billiard table in the basement, we put it in the living room. It’s great when people come over. And the kids play with it a bit, too.”
He also wanted to change many of the design elements in the house.
The staircase in the front hall, for instance, boasted wooden spindles and newel posts.
“We went out to look for wrought iron spindles,” he said.
But Grawey suggested some unusual brushed stainless steel ones instead. They create a sleek, contemporary look against hardwood floors that are stained a dark, chocolate brown.
The two also went in search of a chandelier for the entry hall but couldn’t find one Jonassohn liked.
“I liked those large chandeliers with white shades that you see in restaurants and hotels,” he said. “So we got one custom-made.”
The chandelier is attached to a mechanism that lowers it for cleaning at the touch of a button.
Grawey also organized a renovation in the great room at the back of the house, an area that comprises the kitchen, breakfast nook and den.
A new fireplace was installed in the den and crown mouldings added. Then she and Jonassohn shopped for furniture. Two sleek leather sofas are the key elements in the den along with a wall-mounted television.
Colour was a key consideration, too.
“Jody let me do my thing with the colours,” Grawey said, adding that they chose a palette of taupes, clay tones, steely greys and smoky greens.
In the kitchen, Grawey took her cue from design elements already in place.
“We didn’t change anything in the kitchen,” she said, adding that the green marble countertops were the inspiration for the smoky green walls.
They also chose decorative items that would stand out as conversation pieces. Two pencil cactuses stand in the breakfast nook. The six-foot tall plants have slender finger-like foliage.
“We got a horticulturist here to tell us where they would thrive,” Jonassohn said.
The children were give free rein to choose the design of their bedrooms.
Grawey says that while Jake turned most of the choices over to her, Jesse decided she wanted a palette of red, white and black in her room.
“My daughter loves her room,” Jonassohn said. “She picked the carpet, curtains and bedding.”
In fact, he said, the children approve of their new digs. They spend as much time living with their father as they do with their mother.
“My dad put a lot of work into the house,” Jake said. “He often talks about how he enjoys adding new things to the house. And we love it. It’s nice to have a fresh start. My sister wanted to choose every detail of her bedroom. I didn’t do that as much. I trusted Gabrielle and said: ‘Go ahead.’ And I like what she’s done.”
Jonassohn said creating a warm, inviting home from scratch also involves a lot of small things.
“I’m still discovering things,” he said. “I had bought some ice cream and when my son came home from camp, he said: ‘Where’s the ice cream scoop?’ I didn’t have one. Each time I notice what I’m missing, I go out and buy it. It happens almost on a daily basis.”