6 Homes with Globally Inspired Interiors

It goes without saying that we love celebrating everything that makes Western Canada an extraordinary place to live. But we also can’t deny how gorgeous the design is in other parts of the world, and just how amazing it looks when our region’s top designers borrow those styles, trends and influences. In fact, it’s the globally inspired homes that often end up among our favourites—and if you keep reading, you’ll understand why.

Glam Las Vegas-Inspired Condo

What do you get when a Vancouver-based design firm renovates a cookie-cutter condo for a jet-setting pro poker player? A style that perfectly blends West Coast sensibility with Las Vegas luxury. In this living room, for example, Medina Design House paired a relaxed sofa with a sleek glass-topped coffee table and a shimmery area rug.

Cozy Japan- and Scandinavia-Inspired Retreat

It was a painting (one that now hangs in this home’s library) that inspired designer Katie Rioux to give this home a Japandi aesthetic: a design that blends Japanese minimalism with Scandinavian natural materials

“[The piece was] almost like a Japanese garden, it had these rust tones and greens, and the homeowners really loved these colours,” she says. Those same colours were then pulled into other elements of the home, including the accent chairs and marble coffee table in the living room, the rattan lighting fixtures in the bedroom and the custom mural on the patio.

Cool New York-Inspired Apartment

With expansive city views, an open loft floor plan and a roomy 500-square-foot patio, the bones of this condo have always given off a cool New York vibe—but the interiors didn’t match. “A bachelor lived there before,” explains designer Chad Falkenberg. “There were a lot of mirrors.”

He and the team at Falken Reynolds completely gutted and renovated the 1,100-square-foot space, bringing in mixed woods, black powder coated metal accents, exposed industrial shelving and subway tiles. Now, it looks straight out of Brooklyn.

Elegant Paris-Inspired Family Home

The owners of this 4,200-square-foot Burnaby home asked designer Jaclyn Pett of Heirloom Projects to blend the elegance of traditional Parisian style with modern finishes—and she delivered. Inside, ceiling medallions and dentil mouldings are juxtaposed with contemporary materials like Arabescato Corchia marble and oak hardwoods that will withstand the test of time.

Colourful Palm Springs-Inspired Gem by Paul Lavoie

Originally built by people who spent a lot of time in California in the 1960s, this Calgary home seemed made for designer Paul Lavoie and his husband Doug Olafson. “They brought that California flavour back to Alberta, that mid-century inside-outside lifestyle,” he says. “I knew what the intention was—I was the perfect person to buy it.”

Lavoie modernized the design while respecting the integrity of the home: the original fireplace was adorned with a Graham Gillmore painting, rickety sliding doors were replaced with a 22-foot disappearing Nanawall bifold door and the asphalt pad that covered most of the yard was ripped up to make room for a pool and landscaping.

Enchanting Multinational-Inspired Home

Designer Stephanie Brown somehow managed to combine not one, not two, but four global styles in this Calgary home: India, France, New York and Japan.

She worked closely with her clients to turn single beloved elements into focal points in various rooms throughout the house. The sitting room was designed around the homeowners’ favourite 100-year-old kilim, purchased in Turkey years before. The exterior of the home, meanwhile, is reminiscent of a Manhattan brownstone.