Cottages & Gardens June 2018
Written by Michael Lasses | Photography by Joshua McHugh | View Article
Designer Timothy Brown Gives His Sag Harbor Rental New Life
When interior designer Timothy Brown told a realtor friend that the apartment he was renting outside Sag Harbor wasn’t big enough, she told him she had the perfect place for him. But “perfect” turned out to be a relative term.
“From the front,” Brown says of the cottage he ended up renting, “it’s as ugly as can be.” The previous owners had closed in the garage to make a guest room and slapped unbecoming yellow siding on the exterior. The interior, full of their furniture, had stained wood trim, and “I hated the color of the floor,” the decorator adds. But then there was the view.
Perched on a spit of land known as Bay Point, the 1,200-square-foot house overlooks Long Beach and Noyack Bay. “It was probably designed by a decent architect, but built by a cheap contractor,” Brown opines. “I especially like the sloped ceilings.” In the main room, the ceiling rises from eight to 10 feet above big windows that frame a sweet backyard and the storybook vista. “It was somehow exactly right.”
Because Brown is renting the space, he did not want to spend a lot of money fixing things up. But he still endeavored to put his mark on it. His first move was to clear out the furniture and paint the entire interior Benjamin Moore Decorator’s White. He even painted the tiny kitchen’s metal cabinets, which he personalized with black leather pulls. Next, Brown covered the floors with gray sisal, layering it with area rugs and hides to up the ante on coziness and define seating areas. And a handful of new wooden blinds “makes everything feel fresh.”
