Designer Kelly Wearstler's schedule is a lot like her interiors—glamorous, busy, and full of surprises. In between working on her recent hotel-design projects (two new Viceroy properties in Miami and Anguilla), launching a home-linens collection for Neiman Marcus with Sferra, and filming Bravo's Top Design, the mother of Oliver, 6, and Elliott, 5, lent her talents to her boys' beloved Wagon Wheel school in Los Angeles. Wearstler supervised a renovation of the campus's prekindergarten classroom, decorated the teachers' lounge, and transformed part of the new performance and meeting space with bold shades of yellow, purple, and orange. And it was all pro bono. (Why does making a few dozen brownies for the bake sale suddenly seem so inadequate?)
Before her redesign, Wearstler says, the pre-K classroom felt like a closet. "Oliver was going to go to that classroom every day, so I said to the school's director, 'How about you let me redo it?'"
With the encouragement of the director, Ruth Segal, she enlisted a group of parents and a small construction crew to complete the classroom renovation over the course of a two-week school vacation: exterior orange stripes, a durable yellow linoleum floor, colorful rugs, and more windows for natural light. "Oliver helped me with the colors," she says. "It needed a little sassiness."
Top Design fans know that Wearstler is always good for a little sass. She's known for her cool California-girl attitude, and she has a penchant for outrageous fashion. (She got the blogs buzzing by wearing a turban during one episode last summer.) But despite her demicelebrity status, she relishes the ritual of family dinner (almost) every night, and even the daily 90-minute round-trip from her Beverly Hills home to drop her kids off at school. "When a kid isn't looking you in the face, he'll talk more," she says. "My boys just feel freer to fess up about things from the backseat—if something's bothering them in class, or whatever it is."
As it was with Wagon Wheel's redesign, Wearstler's approach to decorating her family home was considerate of the little guys. The hotels she designs usually require "bulletproof" interiors because of the heavy foot traffic, so she's well versed in stylish yet stain-resistant materials and rugs. "There are so many fabrics out there now—like the ultrasuede from Designtex—that are durable without being ugly," she says.
She also likes to involve her children in the decision-making process. "I'll say, 'Here are four wallpapers—you pick which one.'" Two of her kid-room essentials are blackout shades for better sleep and plenty of storage for stashing toys. Clutter, in fact, is Wearstler's mortal enemy, one she seems to have conquered. "Just try to have a place for everything," she advises. "If you're organized, your kids will be organized," she adds with a laugh, perhaps realizing how hopelessly high her standards may be. "My boys know they're not supposed to mess up the house."
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