Roster of Designers for the Friendship Design Showhouse
Friendship Design Showhouse Abby Wilson February 21, 2024
Friendship Design Showhouse Abby Wilson February 21, 2024
Read below, friends, about the incredible group of designers, artists, and vendor partners we're lucky enough to have on board for the Friendship Design Showhouse, opening to the public on Friday, March 1.
Get your showhouse tickets here
CARA GEORGE, OTEA TEXTILES
Cara George is the founder and Creative Director of Otea, a textile and wallpaper studio launching in May 2024 that is committed to a refined, yet cheeky, old-world maximalism.
With deep reverence for global design traditions, Cara’s patterns are born from her affinity for folk art, vintage kitsch, flora and fauna, and architectural antiquity.
For over a decade, Cara has led projects and teams at highly respected interior design firms like Leanne Ford Interiors, Nickey Kehoe, The Future Perfect, and West Haddon Hall. She has designed spaces, furniture, and textiles, creatively and strategically led product launches, managed full-scale business operations, and developed creative brand partnerships.
She holds a Masters of Interior Architecture and recently relocated to Pittsburgh (her hometown) from Los Angeles, CA.
oteatextiles.com (work in progress - will be live very soon)
Cara's IG spotlight for this event
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DANIEL MANKIN, DANNY MANKIN CREATIVE
Danny Mankin is a Designer, Stylist and Creative Director with 15 years of experience working with some of design’s biggest names and retailers. He’s a passionate, skilled, and emotion-led storyteller whose work spans interiors, retail, fashion and art. Danny’s work has been featured in Architectural Digest, Elle Decor, House Beautiful, and more. As a formally trained Interior Designer, Danny helps bring to life client dreams across residential, commercial, retail, and restaurant spaces. Danny recently relocated to Pittsburgh from Los Angeles with his husband and two pups.
Danny's IG spotlight for this event
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PYE BROWN, PYE BROWN DESIGN
Pye grew up in Australia, gardening with her mum and sisters. She moved to Austin TX in 2015 and has had a professional career in the world of plants and design since 2017. After completing multiple courses in botany, horticulture and landscape design, and working across many fields in the industry, she founded Pye Loves Plants as a design, installation and maintenance business.
The physical work and hands in the dirt taught her invaluable lessons about our environment and she developed a philosophy for creating eco friendly outdoor spaces. That, along with her innate ability to keenly listen to and understand clients needs, saw her business evolve into a design and consultation only model.
Now, she and her husband live in Pittsburgh PA with their daughter, dog and kitty. She absolutely loves this city, and feels privileged to play a role in making your portion of it even more beautiful.
https://www.pyelovesplants.com/
Pye's IG spotlight for this event
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KACIE COPE, KACIE COPE INTERIORS
Kacie Cope is the owner of Kacie Cope Interiors and The Bold, her retail and design studio that offers a variety of interior design-centric workshops and classes. She’s a proud fourth-generation Sharpsburg resident, currently renovating her own 1880 rowhouse.
Inspired by the Latin proverb "Fortune Favors the Bold," Kacie’s shop is named after her grandmother, Fortune, who owned Fortune's Produce in the 1970s—which was situated just across the street from Kacie's studio in Sharpsburg.
Kacie's style reflects a respect for tradition while infusing spaces with a fresh, modern perspective. Each project is a testament to her ability to blend the past with the present, and she believes that the best homes are the ones that tell the stories of the people who live in them. She loves working with clients on budgets and those who want to find their own ways back home.
instagram.com/kaciecopeinteriors/
Kacie's IG spotlight for this event
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MARY MCKITTRICK CAMPBELL
Mary draws inspiration from the changing seasons, weaving together old and new to create warm spaces to welcome family and friends. With experience as a florist, decorator, and store owner (We Took To The Woods in Greenville, SC), she curates pieces to cherish for a season or a lifetime. She firmly believes that a home should be a joyful reflection of the people who live there.
Mary moved to Pittsburgh from South Carolina with her husband and two children in 2022.
Mary's IG spotlight for this event
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AMANDA BOCK, AMANDA BOCK DESIGN
Amanda Bock started her background in Interior Design at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. Despite her love of design, she also pursued degrees in French and Italian (with an MA in Italian Literature) and spent time living abroad before starting her own design business. She focuses on livable luxury for clients who want a designer look and feel, but don’t want their homes to feel like a museum. When she isn’t working on client projects, she’s spending time with her wife, daughter and two dogs and traveling the world as much as possible.
instagram.com/amandabockdesign/
Amanda's IG spotlight for this event
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JANE MEACCI
Jane Meacci, was born in the Pittsburgh area to parents whose families had a long historyrooted in Western Pennsylvania. After moving to Syracuse, NY, she was exposed to a new landscape filled with lakes and streams unlike anything she had seen in Pittsburgh. It was there she developed a great appreciation for her surroundings and her passion to recreate that beautyin her drawings and pastels.Jane grew up in a family who not only valued the arts but many of whom were also in the arts. Her mother could often be found working on her paintings as her children played, her aunt was an antique dealer in New England. Growing up in this world created a deep appreciation in Jane to not only create things that are beautiful but also to surround herself with beautiful things.
That same deep joy and appreciation she derived from living in New York compelled Jane to move to the Blue Ridge Mountains where she graduated from Hollins University, an all women’s university outside of Roanoke, VA, with a BA in Studio Art. During her studies Jane’s passion for art and design drew her to Florence, Italy where she continued to explore her love and passion of art and design. Her time spent in Italy and travel throughout Europe were not only invigorating but inspiring. Travel, be it state to state or country to country, absolutely influenced and lent to the development of her own unique style. As a professional artist, Jane is highly attuned to color, shape, and form. Her lifelong attention to nuance and finding the poetic underbelly of a thought or thing has led her to experiment in and master her expressions in many media forms. It is more than a passionate drive that compels her to create-her innate sensitivity to light, texture, and mood lends itself to the understanding of how to orchestrate interior spaces that support and delight her clients, in an aesthetic that is at once both edgy and timeless. Jane will certainly push your boundaries but bound you in a cocoon of warmth and comfort. Jane’s art, both purchased and commissioned, as well as her interior design projects, can be found in fine homes from coast to coast. Jane and her two children, Eliza and James and their Great Bernese, Etta reside in Mt.Lebanon, PA. One thing she has learned from having children and dogs over the years is that design should be fun and functional as well as unique. Creating spaces and artwork that are accessible to all,and creating visually appealing spaces where family and friends can comfortably gather is one of the things that brings Jane great joy.
instagram.com/janemcollection/
Jane's IG spotlight for this event
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HENRY DRAGENFLO
Henry Dragenflo operates on a need to know basis - he needs to know what you’re thinking. In all his work as a librarian, atelierista and educator, and in his enthusiasm for design, Henry pulls out ideas from his clients and frames the way for them to find whatever they feel like is success for themselves. He has a special affinity for working with children; sometimes he thinks only children have new ideas because they are inventing all day, every day. Henry’s favorite projects keep the participant in focus and the outcomes blurry until all of a sudden they emerge delightfully in unexpected ways. He hopes you enjoy playing, building and wondering with him. Email him: [email protected]
Henry's IG spotlight for this event
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Partner Vendors:
Perlora
Bass and Bennett
Loft Home
instagram.com/lofthome.design/
The Color Palette + Benjamin Moore
We’re in the Experience Business, Not the Transaction Business “It is not enough that we build products that function, that are understandable and usable, we also need to build products that bring joy and excitement, pleasure and fun, and, yes, beauty to people’s lives.” – Don Norman, Author, The Design of Everyday Things