Sheila Bridges - Interior Designer

Photo Courtesy of Sheila Bridges.com

Sheila Bridges is one of the most talented and successful interior designers in America. Her trademark, urban chic style has brought her wide acclaim and a clientele that would be the envy of any professional designer. Bridges is also a savvy entrepreneur. Since she founded the business in 1994, Sheila Bridges Designs, Inc. has grown into an over $1.5 million company. Bridges’s experience in business is one of the cornerstones of her accomplishments, and she continues to do her own marketing and managing. Her work has been showcased in publications across the country, and she was named America’s best designer by Time magazine and CNN in 2001. She currently hosts her own television show, Sheila Bridges Designer Living, on the cable TV network Fine Living. The paperback version of her book Furnishing Forward, originally published in 2002, was rereleased in the spring of 2005.

Bridges was born on July 7, 1964, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The daughter of a dentist and a schoolteacher, Bridges went on to Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, to study sociology. She graduated in 1986, completing her senior thesis on race and gender in advertising. With a career in advertising in mind, she set her sights on New York City. Upon her arrival in New York, initially Bridges found it difficult getting the type of work she sought. Originally she had hoped to become the accounts executive for the advertising firm Ogilvie & Martha. However, that was not to be, and Bridges turned to the fashion industry, taking a job at Bloomingdale’s and training to become a retail buyer. She later landed a job with Georgia Armani, but the world of fashion retail failed to hold Bridges’s attention. She enrolled at the Parsons School of Design in New York City, continuing to work in the day and taking classes at night. During this transitional phase, Bridges secured a job at the prestigious architecture firm Shelton, Mindel and Associates. The firm undertook both commercial and residential projects, exposing Bridges to a whole host of creative and vocational possibilities. And thus it was there that she discovered her passion interior design.

After graduating from college in 1993 with a degree in interior design, she did a stint in Florence, Italy, where she studied decorative art at Polimoda design school, further refining her sense of style and composition. Subsequently, Bridges decided to establish her own interior design business. The decision to launch her own company, Sheila Bridges Designs, Inc. the self-assured designer attributes to the lack of African Americans in the industry. Bridges’s objective was to fill the apparent void and provide African Americans with the resources and services to create living environments that were stylish, yet also a reflection of their own cultural experience and tastes. Consequently, out of her own basement, in 1994, Bridges began to ply her trade as an interior designer. She continued to work for the architecture company but used her breaks, lunch times, and weekends to solicit clients and market her talents.

Ironically, it was Bridges’s own home that became the showcase for her dazzling designs. Bridges moved into her landmark historic apartment in Harlem, New York, in 1993. With a spacious canvas before her, she fashioned a masterpiece that became a testament to her creativity and style. Prior to her arrival, Bridges’s apartment served as the set for Spike Lee’s movie Jungle Fever, but it was as a classic display of interior decorating that the apartment would find its fame. Again Bridges’s astute understanding of business came into play. She submitted pictures of her apartment to design magazines to promote her up and coming company, and people began to pay attention to the young and talented Bridges.

Nevertheless, success did not come easily for Bridges; the New York world of interior design is not for the faint of heart, and Bridges’s one-woman show had to battle against staunch competition from well-connected, established companies. Her big break came when she heard that former Uptown Records president Andre Harrell was looking for a new apartment. The determined Bridges called Harrell for four months before he agreed to let her assist him. Bridges ended up selecting and providing the interior design for the apartment. Fashioned in the style of the 1920s Harlem Renaissance, Bridges’s talents were so artistically and authentically applied that the finished product was featured in House & Garden. Yet that was just the beginning of an ever-increasing list of celebrity clients.

Publicity for Bridges’s growing talents continued to grow, as she was interviewed or featured in all the leading design publications and appeared on newsstands across the country. Recognized in House Beautiful magazine’s list of “America’s Most Brilliant Decorators,” and proclaimed best interior designer in America by Time magazine and CNN in 2001, Bridges went from strength to strength, building her professional portfolio and receiving critical acclaim from a myriad of critics and clients.

Indeed, it is her ability to capture the imagination of such a diverse audience that sets Bridges apart form other interior designers. Despite the original impetus for founding Sheila Bridges Designs, Inc., she is reluctant to be pigeonholed as an exclusively African American designer. Bridges has the rare and uncanny ability to envision and bring to life the decorative desires of any client. She is able to inspire trust in her clients, allowing them to share in the creative process, while ensuring they feel comfortable with the decisions that are made. Her celebrity clientele include former President Bill Clinton, hip-hop entrepreneur and rapper Sean “Diddy” Combs, computer software elites Eileen and Peter Norton, former MTV host Bill Bellamy, and acclaimed author Tom Clancy. Bridges embraces the cultural significance of design, but her calling card is the timeless style she encapsulates in the homes and workspaces she decorates.

Although Bridges describes herself as a high-end designer, her work is not colored by the pretentious and gregarious taste that limitless finances can often bring. Bridges is equally at home in designer furniture stores or flea markets. Her creative modus operandi is to craft comfortable homes that are a timeless fusion of antique pieces with modern style that fit the client’s requirements and budget. Moreover, it is Bridges’s goal to branch out and bring her designs to a wider audience, particularly the twenty-five-to forty-five-year-old homemaker a feat she is accomplishing with her characteristic aplomb and hence the release of her book in 2002, Furnishing Forwards: A Practical Guide to Furnishing for a Lifetime. The book provides useful tips to those who enjoy interior design and want to create wonderful homes but who cannot necessarily afford to hire a professional. Bridges gained further exposure with the launch of her network TV show Sheila Bridges Designer Living, which is now in its fourth season. Bridges also appears frequently on NBC’s Today Show. In 1999 Bridges opened her own antique furniture store in Hudson, New York; however, the store subsequently closed.

Ultimately, Bridges aspires to brand her style and products and make them available nationwide. She is particularly interested in producing and marketing furniture, bedding, rugs, and her own line of paint. Her zeal for quality design has already put her among the elite interior decorators in the country, yet according to Bridges, the greatest design ventures evolve over time, so maybe the best is yet to come."np. maxizip.com. nd. 28 November 2010 Web. 25 Feb. 2011."

Work Cited:
http://maxizip.com/2010/11/biography-sheila-bridges-interior-designer-entrepreneur/




Ms. Bridges Website:


http://www.sheilabridges.com/