Interior Design
Architectural, collected interiors where furnishings, art, textiles and colour are inseparable from the architecture itself.
At Martire Custom Homes, interior design is never an afterthought laid over finished walls. It begins in conversation with the architecture, the land and the lives a home will hold. Led personally by Courtenay Martire, our interiors are composed rather than decorated, layered over time and held as one continuous gesture from structure to styling, so that every room feels gathered, lived-in and unmistakably its owner's own.
Interiors as architecture, not decoration
We believe the most resonant rooms are those where furnishings and structure were imagined together. Sightlines and proportion, the fall of natural light, the placement of a fireplace or a run of windows, the depth of a reveal, the meeting of two materials, these are interior decisions as much as architectural ones, and we hold them as a single thought.
Because Martire is most often engaged in the pre-architect and pre-construction phase, we are able to shape ceiling heights, wall planes, joinery and material transitions before they are built. The interior then reads as inevitable rather than applied, with no seam between what was constructed and what was collected.
Collected, layered and deeply personal
A Martire interior is read like a story. We listen closely to each homeowner's history, the way they live, gather, travel and entertain, and translate it into furnishings, art, textiles and colour that feel acquired over a lifetime rather than ordered in a season.
We layer patiently, balancing the energies of a room so that comfort and refinement coexist. Antique beside contemporary, the quiet beside the bold, a worn leather against a polished stone, every piece chosen for how it sits with the next and with the architecture that holds it.
Colour, texture, scale and light
Drawing on more than two decades styling couture and editorial work across New York, Miami, Los Angeles and London, Courtenay carries a trained eye for composition into every plane of the home. Palette is built rather than picked, weighed against the light a room receives at different hours and the materials already in play, until colour, texture and scale settle into one another.
Nothing is treated in isolation. A drapery weight answers a wall finish, a rug grounds a furniture plan, a single artwork sets the temperature of a room, and the whole is tuned as a composition rather than assembled as a list.
Composed by hand, finish to finish
Through long-standing artisan partnerships, we commission custom upholstery, drapery, joinery and bespoke pieces, then direct their making, placement and final dressing ourselves. Sourcing, styling and direction are carried by the studio, so the vision holds intact from first sketch to the last object placed on a shelf.
The home is delivered as a finished portrait, considered down to the styling of a mantel and the dressing of a table, with the homeowner clearly its subject rather than a backdrop to the furniture.
A complete, considered scope.
Engaged as your design lead, Martire carries the work across disciplines so nothing falls between trades.
- Architectural interior concept and direction
- Furniture plans and bespoke furnishings
- Colour, material and finish palettes
- Art curation, sourcing and placement
- Drapery, textiles and soft furnishings
- Custom joinery and built-in millwork
- Lighting plans and decorative fixtures
- Final styling and whole-home dressing
Good to know.
Do you take on interior design separately from construction?
Interior design is one of our core offerings and can be engaged on its own, though it is at its most powerful woven into a larger renovation or custom-home project. We are best brought in early, before or alongside the architect, so the interior and the architecture can be shaped as one. We also carry full artistic direction through to finishes and styling on projects already underway.
When is the ideal moment to bring you in?
The pre-construction phase. Engaging us before plans are settled lets us influence proportion, light, joinery and material transitions that decoration alone can never recover later. That said, we regularly join projects mid-course to bring coherence, layering and a finished hand to rooms that are already taking shape.
What does collected and layered mean in practice?
It means a home that looks gathered over years rather than installed in a day. We mix periods, provenance and texture, balance bold moments against quiet ones, and source pieces with genuine character. The intention is an interior that feels personal and enduring, never staged or tied to a single season. Sourcing and final styling are carried by the studio, so the vision holds intact throughout.
Which areas do you serve for interior design?
We work across Chicago and the affluent suburbs, including Hinsdale, Winnetka, Lake Forest, Oak Brook and the wider North Shore, as well as lakefront homes in Wisconsin, Michigan and Indiana. Select projects are taken on nationwide for the right engagement.
If your home is ready to become a portrait of the people who live in it, we would love to hear its story.