Susannah West Interior Design

I made a move across the country and purchased a newly constructed home. Susannah has worked with me to harmonize the colors and spaces in the home with my existing furniture and also, recommended furniture craftsmen when an additional piece was needed. Finding the right place and grouping for my paintings was a large accomplishment, which she did with patience and accuracy. They enhance the beauty and warmth of my home. We are now working together on purchasing rugs. Her expertise and experience in interior design have been invaluable to me. I am learning from Susannah of the high quality manufacturers and businesses in my area and on-line. There are a lot of decisions to be made in creating a home to reflect your individuality, while maintaining the practical and beautiful qualities. I would highly recommend Susannah West to family, friends, and neighbors.

Susannah is the ultimate professional. She tuned in immediately to our mindset and helped us put our ideas into reality. She was adventurous while keeping our budget in mind. She nailed every deadline with the highest quality. I wanted stunning - and I got stunning!

Susannah first helped me in 1984, when she decorated the master bedroom and one of our daughter's bedrooms in our home. The colors and window treatment in our daughter's bedroom reflected her personality and the furniture she selected was clean and accommodating for a ten year old. Moving out of her sister's room became exciting for her knowing her new room was so special. The master was decorated with perfection using the furniture we already had. The wall color was peaceful and the draperies reflected happiness. She arranged the furniture to maximize the size of the room while making it more comfortable. It turned out to be just what we wanted. I called Susannah in May, 2015, when we decided to sell our home so that we could downsize. Our home was built in 1959, has been redecorated from time to time, but is definitely dated. Susannah was able to work with me from long distance and selected new exterior colors as well as interior colors for our kitchen. She provided me with the information and choices I needed quickly. We followed all of her suggestions and the house actually sold before it was ever listed. Susannah is artistic as well as meticulous which are wonderful characteristics in an Interior Designer. She has a kind disposition and truly listens with her heart so that she can truly learn about her client. She is extremely bright and understanding of what other people enjoy, even if not in her own personal style. She works in a wide range of styles and always with perfection taking into consideration of the lifestyle of her client. I will continue to use Susannah and give her the highest of recommendations.

Working with Susannah West on my homes has been the most rewarding experience! Susannah is a design genius who is meticulous in her quest to meet her client’s needs. She has never failed to take my design challenges, which always include a limited budget, and deliver a solution that surpasses my wildest dreams and expectations! I first began working with Susannah in 2004. We were doing a renovation because we had some water damage, and I decided it was time to get professional interior design help. I knew what I liked but didn’t know where to begin! There were so many details to coordinate. We had a sunroom that we never used because the floor plan was not right. And we needed all new furniture for the family room. Susannah came up with a brilliant plan that solved all those issues. She provided beautiful custom furniture, fabrics, pillows, lamps, plants, accessories, and rugs for the whole downstairs. She coordinated the paint colors and the re-framing of my art. She also found gorgeous wallpaper for my husband’s study, and the perfect wool carpet for the stairs and second floor. We were thrilled with our new space!! In 2008 I called Susannah again to design my son’s bedroom. The room was an extremely small space making it a huge design challenge, particularly since my son needed an upgrade from a single to a double bed. He also needed a functional space to play his video games. Susannah came to the rescue yet again, creating the perfect space with a media wall, colorful storage bins, and a new flat screen TV. She worked with my son to select the right bedspread, pillows, and rug from Pottery Barn Teen. She even found a reclining gaming chair and mini-frig to hold his soft drinks. The result was a room that had the “cool factor” my son was looking for and the functionality that I needed for that room. In 2010 we relocated to a new custom townhouse. Susannah assisted me with all the materials selections prior to moving in, and designed a custom backsplash for our kitchen that was featured on Best of Ava Living! Her original selections of furnishings for our previous home were completely compatible with our new space, so all we needed to complete this space was a masterful space plan to re-arrange the furniture, and a few custom accessories, which she found for us. I contacted Susannah again in 2012 to help me find my dream dining room table. She had recommended something in the past that I was in love with, and she was able to locate that table for us. It is the perfect complement to my antique family storage piece. We are so pleased with everything that she has done!! We recently bought a new home in Cary, and I can’t wait to get together with Susannah to turn this into my dream house all over again!!!

I have known Susannah West since high school, and have seen her interior design work on several occasions over the years. Susannah is an artist, highly creative and talented. As an interior designer, she is both inspired and inspiring. When I began the kitchen remodel of my 1910 Craftsman bungalow in Berkeley, CA, I contacted her for professional help. She reviewed my plans for the kitchen and offered invaluable feedback on the layout, especially the placement of the sink and location of the pantry cabinets. My husband and I were not sure which options would best meet our needs, and Susannah provided clarity. She has done numerous kitchen remodels and knew exactly what the effects would be for the various options. While brilliantly integrating the old kitchen with the expanded new kitchen annex area (after removal of a load-bearing wall and bedroom conversion), she also provided an inspired solution for the placement and viewing of the large TV my husband insisted on--tricky business with little wall space in a Craftsman setting. In addition, I consulted with her about choices for the stove, range hood, and countertops. Remodeling and updating my bungalow over the years I have made several design decisions that I regret. I knew I needed the expertise of a design professional to insure no costly errors, especially given the huge expense of remodeling a 100-year-old kitchen. Susannah is a joy to work with. I love the way her mind works to resolve an issue or solve a problem that others find confounding. She does not rest until she lights upon a perfect solution for her clients’ design challenges at every stage of the undertaking. I remember the two years she took to find the perfect lamp for a client’s waiting room, and the walled-sized painting that pulled together everything in a living room, unifying color, texture, and form. There are countless examples in her portfolio of perfect execution of artful design, formal and informal, functional and decorative. It is no exaggeration to say I revel in the elegant beauty and easy functionalism of my new kitchen every day. I highly, highly recommend her!

Let me say up-front and in capital letters: I WOULD HIGHLY RECOMMEND SUSANNAH WEST to anyone who is looking for professional design advice! After her first project for me 8 years ago, I came back to her repeatedly because, step by step, her inspired vision is making my house BEAUTIFUL for the first time EVER! And Susannah is pure joy to work with! My best friend (NOT an easy person to satisfy) recommended Susannah because she was so delighted with the work she had done in her master bedroom. I had made so many costly decorating mistakes over the years on my own that I decided to see what Susannah could do for me. I wish I had called her years sooner!! Our first project, in 2007, was the living room. This room didn't feel right, but I couldn't put my finger on what it needed. Susannah's gorgeous window treatments, plus her inspired pillows for sofa, chairs, and window-seat were transforming! That quickly, we went from “blah” to “Ahhhh!!!!” and I was hooked. Next we tackled the dining room and adjoining music room, with Susannah guiding me in upholstery selection, the purchase of contemporary art, the design and purchase of custom area rugs, and the installation of crisp linen drapes which she designed. Next up: my kitchen office where we again did a custom rug, along with wainscoting, and a magnificent leaded glass window, which was Susannah's brilliant solution to what had been a weird off-center window at the end of the room. Now EVERYONE comments on this masterful finishing touch! With each project, Susannah has educated me with her skills in visualization. In the master bedroom, those skills, along with Susannah's eye for scale and tile selection, helped me design and install a fireplace that is a delightfully unexpected focal point in a room where the bed usually takes center stage. Also in that room, her guidance in choosing fabric for the window treatments saved me from my “almost-perfect” choice, which would have died on the walls, and led me to choose instead, Susannah's absolutely perfect selection that just sings! Next I needed help choosing a paint color for my husband's upstairs office. Here is where Susannah especially shines. I would never have guessed that selecting a color for an upstairs office would begin downstairs,--but it did. In fact, it began in the dining and music rooms, and led to new carpeting on the stairs and down the hall leading into the upstairs office. Only Susannah would have known this, but she was absolutely RIGHT. There is a beautiful flow now throughout the house. Perfect. In addition, she helped us select furniture, design a window treatment, and hang pictures and awards in this office space. Last year's may have been my favorite project of all--our tiny (3 ½ X 4 ½ foot) downstairs powder room. Like Cinderella's pumpkin turning into a carriage fit for royalty, this beige “closet” with cracked plaster walls, wall-hung sink with flowered fabric skirt, and cheap oak veneer over-the-toilet storage cabinet became an absolute jewel box! When I showed Susannah a beautiful blue and peach vessel bowl I was considering for this space, she began offering ideas immediately: • Wainscoting with an understated tile border to add interest and simple elegance to the tiny space. • Updated lighting, with a space on the back wall to continue our art collection • An enormous mirror to visually double the size of the room, strengthen the natural daylight pouring through the window, and provide a better perspective to view the window as art. • Oh, and, continue the wainscoting out the powder room door into the adjacent hallway to unify the two small spaces, making both of them feel larger. Susannah's design ideas were brilliant! She assembled a portfolio of pictures from Houzz so that I could visualize the final space as she saw it in her mind's eye, and we began deciding the specifics for wainscoting, tile, lights, cabinet, faucets, and mirror. She also insisted that we actually mock-up the wainscoting and tile, to be sure that the scale was perfect. Attention to details like these was crucial in such a small space where any mistake would be magnified. The final result had no mistakes--just simple, tranquil elegance. Working with Susannah is always fun and educational, and the beautiful results keep bringing me back for more. Currently we're working on the laundry room...! :) Elaine Ratliff

I first hired Susannah West in 2005 to help me upgrade the interiors of my North Raleigh home, and I’ve been working with her ever since. When I moved to San Francisco in 2007, I contacted her to help me with the move. She did all the space planning for the move prior to my arrival, including the space planning of my art collection and furniture. Then we began to discuss upgrades, and in the past few years we’ve upgraded every room of my house. This includes the complete studs-down renovation of the kitchen and bathroom, and most recently, the installation of a media room, black bamboo floors, and new carpeting. Susannah has always found creative solutions to my design challenges and has saved me money and stress at the same time. Her excellent software programs and excellentcommunication skills allowed us to complete my projects in a virtual environment from across the country, and with no hiccups. The results of her work? …When people arrive for the first time in my apartment, they are astounded. I receive comments like, “This is fantastic!” and “Your home should be in a decorating magazine”. People in my building have actually asked if they could stop by and see my home because they heard the remodel is so wonderful! My recommendation? …I hope you will be as fortunate to work with Susannah as I’ve been. I have been very, very pleased!!

In 2003 my late wife contacted Susannah West to solve a decorating problem. My wife had been looking unsuccessfully all over Raleigh for a replacement for our master bedroom draperies, which were disintegrating from years of exposure to the sun. Also, we now had a queen size bed, but the old coverlet and dust ruffle were made to fit a double. We were actually hoping to find the same fabric, since it was a classic American design, and we loved the room just the way it was. My wife had not found anything that she liked in the usual fabric stores, and was hoping that a designer could locate the original fabric, or a satisfactory replacement, from the Trade Only showrooms. Susannah did not find the original fabric, but did find several likely candidates to work with; but my wife didn’t really LOVE any of them. So Susannah said she would go back and look again. While she was in the Trade showroom she saw a pattern that looked like ours, but a different color. She asked the manager if there were possibly different colors in the back, even though they had no samples out on the racks. The manager said “No, everything is out.” Susannah didn’t stop. She asked the manager to please call the company to see if it came in any other colors. When they checked, they found that the EXACT COLOR of our old fabric indeed had been available, but was now discontinued. They had a few yards in stock, but not enough to reproduce our bedroom the way it had been. Susannah came up with a creative solution that provided us a new queen coverlet in the loved fabric, with draperies in a coordinating different fabric, and remaking the existing dust ruffle to fit the queen bed. My wife was ecstatic! The new room was updated and fresh, but still had our favorite classic design. My wife recommended Susannah to her friends every chance she got! And we worked with Susannah again on several other projects.

I am a Do-It-Yourselfer, doing a complete whole house renovation, inside and outside. I call on Susannah as needed on everything that involves interior design. Susannah has provided invaluable guidance on my remodeling project over the past 5 years. We are currently working on my study and I need the skilled eye of a designer to keep my project on the right track. She has assisted me with selections and design of kitchen cabinets, granite, travertine flooring and backsplash, exotic wood flooring, oriental rugs, paint colors, and specialty paint finishes, including faux finish combinations, as well as exterior colors. Susannah has extensive experience in the construction process, and the ability to envision what the finished space will look like. She has become familiar with my style preferences, and skillfully guides me to the most appropriate choices. I highly recommend her.

I would highly recommend Susannah West as a designer. She is competent, creative, cost-conscious and completely fun to work with! I am a repeat customer. I first hired Susannah in 2011 to help me plan our home office. We had a hodge-podge of furniture, and we needed to create a space to serve 3 functions: 2 home office areas and a guest bed. Susannah did a beautiful and stylish plan, in which everything fit perfectly. She designed a custom desk and built-in bookcases to match the existing hanging cabinets, and then gave me step-by-step instructions on how to complete the project. I was thrilled with it! So when it was time to remodel the kitchen, I called her! She began by listening carefully to my woes about my old, small kitchen (the layout was so squeezed that fully half of this kitchen was never used. I never wanted anyone to help me in that kitchen---it was too forlorn.) First, Susannah helped me explore options and develop a budget. Then she came up with a functional plan: a curved window seat that wraps around two walls and provides comfy seating at the new butcher-block island. She provided scaled drawings and color renderings of this plan, so we could analyze the options before making our selections. Now we use our new kitchen every night for candlelight dinners for two, or when two other guests join us. Even better, several others can now visit with me in the kitchen because the wraparound window seat can accommodate them. Perfect! During the planning and construction stages, Susannah saved me money, time, and possible mistakes that I would have made naively without her guidance. She found a very affordable but luxurious tile for our backsplash, and everyone thinks its Carrera marble. (It isn’t!) She pointed me to websites where I could do the research myself and save shopping trips at the same time. Susannah’s high standards also saved me two possible mistakes in matching colors: her close scrutiny and good instincts told her that two color choices I would have made would not be a match for the other materials. She was right, and fortunately I listened to her! Susannah is prompt, cheerful, attentive and so agreeable with all contractors and vendors. She has long established relationships with many in the design and construction field, and these contacts benefit her clients. Susannah West is a wonderful professional, and I plan to work with her on additional spaces in our home. I highly recommend her. Cynthia Powell Barnett 2004 Flagstone Place Raleigh, NC 27612

I worked with Susannah West for over 2 years when my husband and I downsized to a new retirement home. She provided a variety of services including selection of floor and countertop materials prior to moving in, selection of custom sofa and chairs and wood pieces in the living area, selection of custom fabrics, trims, and pillows, window treatments, custom silk plants, breakfast area furniture, rugs, lamps and light fixtures, and wall colors. She was able to work with our existing furniture pieces that we wanted to keep and make them work with new pieces. She also helped us with furniture and accessory placement within our home. Susannah's attention to detail and eye for quality is amazing. This attention saved me from making mistakes. She also has the ability to understand the style that I like. As a result our home has just the fell that I was hoping for. I particularly love the fabrics and the trims the she helped me to select as well as the selection of some new accessories to complement our existing accessories. When friends come into our home, we often hear the comment that our decorating looks like a picture from a design magazine. I highly recommend Susannah.

In 2011 I engaged Susannah West to assist me in planning and furnishing my empty apartment in San Francisco. I am working full-time in a start-up, and have neither the knowledge, time nor patience to do this project myself. I was familiar with her work and knew she had the artistry, skills and resources to successfully complete the project in the short time frame that I was expecting. I had some art and travel photos that I wanted to use, but I really had no idea where to begin. Susannah began with a design plan based on my needs and functionality. And then she built the space around my art and photos. She provided digital floor plans and elevations, which were invaluable in visualizing the project and carrying it through to completion. I'd been living in dorms, apartments, and rental houses for the last 10 years so I wasn’t sure what my “style” was, but she helped me figure out what I needed to have a comfortable place I could finally call home. She sourced all the furnishings, rugs, lighting and accessories. She gave me several nice choices for each group, and explained the pros and cons for each choice. She worked hard to get the look I wanted and still stay on budget. I couldn't have been happier with the result! This year I contacted Susannah again to help me finish the rest of the space. I've received so many compliments on my "beautiful apartment" that it would have been a mistake not to! I wholeheartedly recommend Susannah for any interior design work. She is talented, professional, thorough, a good listener, and most importantly a friend in the process.