Josh Greene Transforms a New York Apartment Using an Inspired Palette of Rich Jewel Tones
Located in the city’s creative Chelsea neighborhood, the intimate address layers deep shades of rust, green, and mustard yellow with a thoughtful selection of family heirloom artworks
The far west corner of New York’s Chelsea neighborhood draws a creative community for the proliferation of art and design galleries that dot streets lined with unique buildings by some of architecture’s most revered names. So when designer Josh Greene got a call from a friend who had purchased a two-bedroom apartment in one such tower, he was surprised to find the intimate interior to be more builder grade than beautiful. “But I could see the vision here,” says Greene. “I liked the layout—the rooms just needed to be redone.”
For the most part, Greene preserved the interior’s footprint except in the entry, where he crafted a cased opening that serves as a decorative showcase for a bold geometric wall covering from his new collection. “I don’t like when things kind of spill from one space into the next,” says Greene. “We didn’t close it off very much; we just tailored it so it felt better.”
The primary bedroom also received a rethink. Greene peeled away a warren of hallways that led to a vestibule, a closet, and the main bath, and instead created a singular passageway lined with floor-to-ceiling closets painted a rich, moody hue. “It was an easy change, nothing complicated, but those little things really make a big impact on the space and how you experience it,” he says.
Paint and furnishings helped change the vibe in other areas, like the living room, where Greene installed a custom sofa, made with a terra-cotta Larsen fabric, that physically wraps around an interior column, and an expansive cabinet that hides a pop-up television. However, the latter’s mechanism made it challenging to find art that would hold the space when the television was recessed and allow it to move up and down unencumbered. The solution came by commissioning a vibrant wall work by Los Angeles artist Thomas Rodehuth, who painted a fantasy landscape in punctuating earth tones on canvas, which is then tacked directly to the wall.
Those same rich hues envelop other areas of the home, like an adjacent office coated in a stunning conifer green that plays off a bespoke daybed in a Brochier fabric, Ceramicah lamp, and Vitra chair in complementary shades. In other areas of the apartment, materials helped amplify the aesthetic, such as in the kitchen, where a matte tile abuts a custom room divider of vertical slats that diffuses light in a stunning play of shadow, or in the main bath, where a heavily striated silver travertine installed floor to ceiling adds visual interest. “I think it’s more relaxing to the eye to have less materials,” says Greene.
Equally expressive is the client’s assortment of artworks, many of them family heirlooms. Greene, a fan of artist Dan Christensen, was surprised to find one of the painter’s exuberant abstracts in the mix, and he installed the canvas in the client’s office. More vibrant pieces animate a denim blue hallway leading to the primary suite, where a Grant Legan photograph surmounts a Lawson-Fenning bed in a Pierre Frey fabric and pair of bright blue nightstands of Greene’s design. “I’ve always loved that image and saved it for years,” recalls Greene.
Perhaps one of the most unique art moments happens in the Milanese-inspired powder room, where another inherited sculpture, placed on a plinth, is spotlighted with an Apparatus fixture, then backed with a Dedar wall covering and smoked mirror. It’s just one of many bold moments in this jewel box apartment, composed by a visionary designer with a love of color and a client not afraid to just go with it.