A tailored approach to home furnishings
GROWING HOME DECOR BUSINESS EMBRACES A ‘ DIFFERENT WORLD’
The design of your home should fit you as well as any article of clothing.
That’s the philosophy of The Tailored Home, which debuted in Westport three years ago and just added a Greenwich outpost in June.
The beauty of the furniture and other items, and the layout of the two stores, are meant to spark ideas about what you might do with your own place. The handmade furniture and fixtures are for sale, but craftsmen can make brand new pieces as well.
The company is the creation of Jhon Ortiz and Scott Falciglia, who are partners in life as well as business.
“The name was important,” Falciglia says during an interview in Greenwich. “It was the last name on a list of other options.”
“Wrapped” was a finalist, but didn’t seem fresh enough for the expectations Falciglia and Ortiz had for their new venture.
The eventual name was perfect “because quite literally you’re tailoring your home,” he explains. “It’s like a suit ... you need ( accurate) body measurements for the comfort and fit you want.”
The two men are ready to “tailor” all sorts of home design solutions, from a new residence that needs to be furnished from top to bottom, to clients who need help figuring out how to place their old objects when they move.
“We have one client that we are just helping to move in. Unpacking. Styling walls. Using her existing stuff,” Falciglia says.
There is no one right way to work on home design with clients, he stresses. “The relationship has to keep changing for everyone’s sake ... there is a wide range of roles that any designer will take on. It’s a very intimate thing even if the relationship doesn’t always feel that way.”
The Internet and social media have removed what used to be a tricky first step in finding the right designer — i. e. seeing whether or not you are on the same taste wavelength. The vision of Ortiz and Falciglia is vividly illustrated on their beautiful and detailed website as well as the carefully curated Instagram account. Just as a dating app can be a good first step in finding the right mate, you can narrow down a list of potential designers by seeing how they express themselves online.
“The web draws all sorts of people ... sometimes you don’t attract the people you expect,” Falciglia says of the way client stereotypes can crumble when you put yourself or your business out there. He also has a blog on the Tailored Home website that goes deeper into his philosophy of design and furniture making.
The days of a design/ furnishings store representing itself by one ad in a glossy magazine or newspaper are over, he says. “We have a full- time graphic designer who collaborates with us on producing content, including videos. We are aware of how important image is ( and we want ours) to be expressive and fun.”
For the Greenwich opening, the Tailored Home created videos of zebra- and leopard- print pieces sitting outside in beautiful natural settings, with animal noises in the background.
“I think what we are trying to do here is to make uncommon designs seem more accessible to people.” Falciglia says, adding, “We want to present big design ideas in a relaxed setting.”
Just as there has been a rise in interest in locally sourced food, the Tailored Home partners are proud of the fact that their pieces are all made in a Norwalk workshop. The solid frames of the furniture are guaranteed for life and the reupholsterers are ready to do the revamping for any changes that new interior designs might call for.
“Globalization has served its purpose, but I don’t think it is going backwards to do things locally,” Falciglia says, adding that this local craftsmen movement serves both the environment and the economy.
More frequent home design changes will be part of a 21st- century world in which few workers can expect to hold down the same job or live in the same place for most of their lifetime, as earlier generations did.
Falciglia writes on his blog about 10- year cycles of reinvention. With lifetime job security a thing of the past, people will be creating new lives and new homes more frequently during the course of a lifetime — “Your father and my father lived in a different world.”
With so much change going on around everyone the comforts of home have become more important than ever. But even the most beautiful pieces of furniture, and the most striking works of art, can become invisible in a home where they stay fixed in place forever.
“What we try to do is mix ( favorite) old pieces with new things — design can be fun when you think about it that way... you shouldn’t necessarily have to wipe the slate clean if the design was done well the prior time,” he says.
“I THINK WHAT WE ARE TRYING TO DO HERE IS TO MAKE UNCOMMON DESIGNS SEEM MORE ACCESSIBLE TO PEOPLE.”