Art Direction & Material Selection
Complete artistic direction for the home, colour, materials, finishes, art and styling, composed with the eye of a fashion and photography stylist.
Every home is, in the end, a composition, of light and shadow, texture and tone, the things chosen and the way they are placed. Art direction is the discipline that holds all of it to a single intention. At Martire Custom Homes, Courtenay Martire carries that direction personally, bringing more than two decades of styling couture and editorial work across New York, Miami, Los Angeles and London to the material life of the home: the palette, the finishes, the art and the final styling. Engaged early, before the architecture hardens, that eye shapes how a home is seen and felt long before it is furnished, so the finished rooms read as one considered portrait rather than a sequence of separate decisions.
A fashion and photography eye, applied to the home
Styling a couture shoot and composing a room call on the same instinct: how colour reads against skin and stone, how a single texture changes everything beside it, how light falls and where the eye is meant to rest. Courtenay's background trained that instinct over years on set, and it is precisely what she brings to the home, proportion, contrast, restraint and the confidence to let one bold gesture carry a quiet room.
Art direction is the connective intelligence beneath a Martire interior. It is the reason a palette holds together from the entry to the topmost floor, the reason a material answers the light it lives in, and the reason nothing in the finished home feels accidental. The homeowner remains the subject; every choice is made so the space flatters the life within it.
Materials, finishes and colour, chosen rather than specified
Material selection at this level is never pulled from a catalogue. Stone is chosen slab by slab for its movement and tone; woods, metals and plasters are weighed for how they age and how they meet one another; paint and pigment are tested against the home's own light at different hours. Colour is composed with real theory behind it, temperature, saturation and the way a scheme carries from room to room, not assembled swatch by swatch in isolation.
Because Martire is most often engaged in the pre-architect and pre-construction phase, these decisions can be made while they still shape the architecture rather than decorate around it. Finishes, material transitions and the palette are resolved early and held to one hand through every trade, so the home arrives coherent rather than corrected.
Art, styling and the final composition
A home is only finished when it is styled. Drawing on long-standing relationships with artisans, galleries and makers, Martire curates and commissions art, then directs its placement, scale and framing against the architecture that holds it. The last layer, the dressing of a room, the objects gathered on a surface, the balance of a wall, is composed by hand, the way a final shot is styled before the shutter falls.
This is where a home's energies settle into balance, and where the homeowner's soul print becomes visible: collected, personal and unmistakably theirs. The aim is always a home that feels gathered over a lifetime rather than installed in a season, a portrait, with its owner quietly at the centre.
A complete, considered scope.
Engaged as your design lead, Martire carries the work across disciplines so nothing falls between trades.
- Complete artistic direction across the home
- Colour theory and whole-home palette development
- Material and finish selection, sourced by hand
- Stone, surface and natural material curation
- Art curation, commissioning and placement
- Final styling and whole-home dressing
- Lighting, texture and tonal balancing
- One coherent vision from pre-construction to finish
Good to know.
What does art direction mean for a home, exactly?
It is the single creative intelligence that holds every visual decision to one intention, colour, materials, finishes, art and styling. Rather than choosing elements piece by piece, Courtenay composes them in relation to one another and to the architecture, so the finished home reads as a coherent whole. It is the same discipline that shapes an editorial shoot, applied to the way a home is seen and lived in.
When should art direction and material selection begin?
As early as possible, ideally in the pre-architect or pre-construction phase. Material and finish decisions made early can shape proportion, light and the architecture itself, rather than being applied as decoration later. Engaging at this stage lets the palette and the materials be resolved in the right sequence and held to one hand through every trade.
Can this be engaged on its own, or only within a renovation?
Art direction and material selection are most powerful woven into a larger renovation, addition or custom home, where they can shape the architecture as well as the finishes. They can also be engaged as a focused layer of direction on a substantial, design-led project already underway. It is best suited to serious, whole-home work rather than single isolated rooms.
How does Courtenay's fashion background shape this work?
More than two decades styling couture and beauty across New York, Miami, Los Angeles and London trained a precise eye for colour, texture, scale and light. That sensibility carries directly into the home, in how a palette is balanced, how materials are paired, and how a room is finally styled. It is what makes a Martire interior feel composed and personal rather than decorated.
If your home is ready to be composed as one considered whole, we would be glad to begin the conversation.