How I Curate My Space: Athena Calderone’s Elegant And Homely NYC Atelier
In our series on interiors, we invite designers and tastemakers to open the doors to their most-loved spaces, sharing the stories, inspirations and treasured pieces within. Here, interior designer and creative director ATHENA CALDERONE welcomes us into the Manhattan studio she has transformed into a hub for inspiration, gatherings and creativity. By VICTORIA NEWTON-SYMS
As the founder and CEO of lifestyle brand EyeSwoon, as well as her own eponymous design practice, Athena Calderone is renowned for her singular vision of modern elegance, offering her 1.1 million Instagram followers an artfully curated glimpse into her world. Whether revealing the evolving beauty of her Tribeca apartment that she’s currently renovating, the serene charm of her Amagansett house in the Hamptons, or lovingly prepared recipes she’s cooking at home, every moment is layered with intention.
“My home has always been my business, and my business has always been my home,” she says of the seamless way her passions and profession intertwine. After selling their Brooklyn townhouse in 2024, Calderone and her husband, Victor, purchased a historic apartment in Tribeca, and soon after, she opened her own studio in the same neighborhood. “When conceiving the design of the Atelier, I approached it as I would a home, inserting a similar intimacy, intention, and warmth,” she says.
“My kitchen is where I learned to take risks, to trust my instincts, to find community
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It was a blank, white industrial space with sweeping 11th floor views. “To accentuate the natural light and soften the architecture, I framed the expansive windows in a creamy, sumptuous textile. This airy veil invites the outside in while infusing the space with quiet elegance.” Recognizing the overall potential, she began layering it with decorative details and furniture from her homes. “The end result is a studio that feels immediately inviting, encouraging connection and creativity, just like home.”
Already, the Atelier has become an essential gathering place for Calderone and her team. “I am highly visual, but I also need to touch fabrics, to gather and review samples, and collaborate – and I prefer to do this creative work in person,” she explains. “Our space creates an environment that is ripe for creativity and innovation.”
While the overall design reflects the ambitions of her growing studio, it is the kitchen that holds the most personal meaning – a thread connecting her back to writing her first book, Cook Beautiful, in 2017. “It’s where I learned to take risks, to trust my instincts, to find community,” she says.
But deciding on the layout of the Atelier was not without its obstacles. “It all began with the architecture; specifically, the challenge of two awkward columns at the center of the raw space. The idea of a cube emerged to conceal them, but as is often the case in design, the problem unveiled the solution: it became clear that the kitchen belonged between those columns,” she says. “Suddenly, the antagonist of our space became the hero, shaping everything that followed.”
Eight years after designing the now-iconic kitchen in her Brooklyn townhouse (which you’ve likely come across in magazines and on Pinterest), Calderone was ready to take a bold new direction with the Atelier. “A rare Paul Dupré-Lafon low table was my conceptual anchor. The design and materiality – wood, parchment and seaming detail – became my fixation and inspiration for the kitchen.”
“I framed the perimeter of the kitchen island in wood, something I hadn’t seen before in kitchen design,” she reveals. “Honey onyx appears as long, vertical panels in the backsplash and across the island; the elegant proportion and subtle veining echo the parchment of the Lafon table. These details introduced a rhythmic pattern that became a quiet but intentional throughline picked up again in the grid of glass block, which allows light to filter into the hidden rooms behind.”
For the entryway, Calderone sourced a striking Miguel Macaya oil painting at auction, setting the tone for the rest of the space. From there, she combined pieces from her personal collection with items of her own design, such as a patinated bronze model of Spinaro from Patrick McGrath Design placed atop a burl wood round dining table from her Crate & Barrel line.
In the living area, a velvet sofa and stone and wood coffee table form the foundation, while an abstract oil painting, an Art Deco side table, a parchment and steel lamp from Interni Venosta (discovered at Milan Design Week two years ago), and an antique Japanese silver-leaf screen, inspired by her recent trip to Kyoto, all contribute to what she describes as “a quiet tension between past and present – something I always seek to achieve in design.”
“I’m so happy with how the design and styling of this space came together – elegant, refined and meaningful
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“What I love most about interior design is the amalgamation of lived experiences and visual references,” she says. “Those moments that force you to pause – a stone detail glimpsed in a Parisian museum, the low frame of a 1930s table discovered on Pinterest, the glow of a parchment sconce against the slick wood in a Viennese café – all unknowingly live somewhere in your creative consciousness, forming a personal encyclopaedia of inspiration. That’s the magic of design: when years of quiet noticing become something distinctly your own.”
It is the homeliness of the Tribeca studio – “the abundance of natural light, the cozy living room area, and the chef’s kitchen where we can actually cook lunch” – that Calderone believes influences the overall mood, motivation, and desire to come into work each day.
As she reflects on the completed space, she notes: “I’m so happy with how the design and styling of this space came together – elegant, refined and meaningful. But as with any room, it will continue to shift and evolve over time. That’s the beauty of a living space: it’s never quite finished.”