Robert Ledingham Memorial Award 2026: Schédio Spaces

It makes sense to learn that Jenalee Nordstrom has been able to ride the waves of her surprising, challenging and creative career: she was raised on a fishing boat, after all. It’s in her nature to embrace possibility, to weather a storm and to adapt to changing tides.

Admittedly, it’s not a typical design education—but it’s one that has well served this year’s winner of the Robert Ledingham Memorial Award for an Emerging Interior Designer.

As a kid, she’d spend high season by her father’s side, charting the waters surrounding Vancouver Island. Nordstrom credits him for her confident decision-making. “He’d ask ‘Where do you want to go this season?’ and I’d decide and he was like, ‘Okay, that’s where we’re going.’ That made it clear to me that my voice mattered.” (She also credits that upbringing for her direct communication style—“I’m very blunt. I’m still the fisherman’s daughter at the end of the day. I forget that I’m supposed to sugarcoat things as a boss.”)

On the high seas, she had no TV, no pop culture, “no external stimulus other than the ocean,” Nordstrom recalls. “So I was very, very imaginative.” When she wasn’t helping her dad fix a pulley system, she’d spend her days drawing and dreaming; when fishing season was over and she was back on land, she’d be redecorating her own room nonstop.

This creative streak landed her a spot at the acclaimed Fashion Institute of Technology after high school. “I literally went straight from the boat to New York City,” Nordstrom laughs. She majored in pattern-making, learning to draft by hand: a skill that neatly complemented the construction-adjacent know-how she’d picked up while helping her dad weld and do repairs. “That process of understanding how you construct something two-dimensional into a three-dimensional form has been the single most foundational and beneficial aspect I bring into this industry now,” says Nordstrom. “I can’t stress how key it’s been to know how to physically build something.”

Decades later, her voice, vision and technical capabilities remain strong, and form the backbone of the wildly creative Schédio Spaces, the design-build firm she runs with husband and business partner Christopher. The two started the firm organically, during a time they were both on medical leave from their corporate jobs: a personal renovation of their Main Street loft led to a sale that earned a surprising chunk of cash, which they used to buy and flip another place… then another, then another. They never went back to work.

SPACES THAT SOOTHE: “Our spaces impact us hugely,” says Nordstrom. “When something is super functional and everything can be away, then the nervous system can relax.” Photo by Janis Nicolay.

Instead, her husband taught her to build cabinets and together they gutted the apartments and crafted custom millwork. “I taught him how to tile, and then he taught me how to do flooring, and I taught him to sew the drapery,” she says. “We were both the carpenter and designer, just doing it all together.” The requests for custom work started rolling in.

Eight years later, the couple has divvied up the workload more distinctly—she now is the dedicated designer, he leads construction—but they still happily spend “23 hours a day together,” says Nordstrom.

And while Schédio now employs a construction team and has plenty of design office support, Nordstrom still handles 100 percent of the design herself, and does her own shop drawings. (A furniture line is currently in the works, too.) Her fashion education and impressive range of practical skills are supplemented by a voracious appetite for self-education. “I consider myself to be an autodidact,” says Nordstrom. She’s thrilled to deep-dive into the latest in concrete formulation, get her hands dirty in a metal shop or nerd out on Japanese joinery techniques for hours. She’ll research the human nervous system in her spare time to ensure her spaces are truly designed to calm and soothe. “It’s hilarious that I get to do this as a career,” she laughs. “It’s too good to be true.”

But it is true, as evidenced by the dozens of residential and commercial projects now out there in the world. For instance: 2025’s Archē project. Here, Schédio gutted a 1978 Vancouver Special and reimagined it as a light-filled, spatially dynamic family home, moving the original roofline to create 14-foot vaulted ceilings. A full wall of glazing dramatically increased the natural light, and the layout was inverted—Nordstrom relocated primary living spaces to the upper level to maximize daylight and connection to the outdoors. Cork floors and terracotta cabinetry add warmth; a restored piano in punchy citron brings the fun to a disciplined architectural framework.

Over in Vancouver’s Southlands, Nordstrom approached a renovation with a nod to European architectural tradition. Originally, the family home (dubbed Afxano) was heavily compartmentalized, until Nordstrom opened things up and brought in vaulted ceilings with white oak beams. Continuous detailing embeds lighting within slatted and panelled surfaces. There’s a rhythm and depth here, created through shadow and material continuity. A monumental hand-sculpted fireplace is at the heart of the space; white oak herringbone flooring, blue quartzite accents, lacquered and oak millwork and hand-detailed trim reference European and Art Deco traditions.

THE CONNECTING THREAD: The studio operates as an interior architecture practice rather than a decorative one. “I really love working with shadows: pulling things out, pushing things in, things coming into the walls or coming out from the walls,” says Nordstrom. Her fashion skills come in handy when it comes to bringing ideas to life, trading fabric for veneer. “I’m showing the shop how to cut a pattern to make a bullnose, because it’s just like the cup of a bra,” she explains. “I’m using language from the fashion world with my team, like, oh, let’s just put a dart in it.” Photo by Tina Kulic.

Afxano. Photo by Tina Kulic.

At its core, Schédio Spaces treats every project as a single spatial construct—designed, detailed and built as a complete environment rather than a composition of parts. Nothing is repeated. Each material system, millwork strategy and spatial condition is developed specifically for the project it belongs to. “I think of our residential spaces as three-dimensional, sculptural art that you’re living inside of,” says Nordstrom. The materiality and feeling may change, project to project, but depth and dimension remain the common thread.

It’s detailed, nitpicky work. But it all comes together in the end to create something bigger than the sum of its parts. Judge Matt Davis, founding partner at Toronto’s DesignAgency, describes Nordstrom’s work as “wildly expressive and bold.” At the end of every project, the team steps away to give Nordstrom a moment to really take it all in.

“I take 15 minutes, and it’s just me, and it’s exactly how I imagined it. And it’s the biggest high you’ll ever get,” she says. “People talk about manifestation all the time, but I thought of something, and now I’m in it. It’s the biggest trip. I get goosebumps.”

Jenalee Nordstrom on Design

Jenalee Nordstrom of Schédio Spaces. Photo by Tanya Goehring.

What was your first design project?

I redecorated my childhood bedroom constantly… I was regularly moving the furniture around to try new configurations and swapping out art and paint colours to switch up the vibes. I even designed a custom shelving unit (at 10 years old) that let me move the shelves and change the shape and scale according to my ever-changing collection of trinkets.

What books are on your nightstand?

How to Understand the Mind by Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche. Book cover courtesy of Kadampa Buddhism.

How to Understand the Mind by Geshe Kelsang Gyatso Rinpoche: possibly the best book ever written. It’s both practical and profound and offers deep insight into our mind. It shows how an understanding of its nature and functions can be used practically in everyday experiences to improve our lives.

What are you listening to right now?

Goldie Boutilier. Image courtesy of AdmitONE.

Goldie Boutilier—she’s a singer-songwriter with incredible storytelling, cool energy and killer style. She makes the kind of music you want to dance to.

Jenalee’s Local Favourites

For Dinner

My Vancouver favourite will forever be The Acorn. Fresh local produce that changes seasonally and is incredibly flavourful. It’s plant-forward and every bite packs a punch.

For Coffee

For actual coffee it has to be Di Beppe. They make the best cappuccino in the city and the Italian energy is on point.

For a Cocktail

Head downstairs to hear the vinyl at Lala, the cocktail bar beneath June on Cambie. Photo by Juno Kim.

Lala is my absolute favourite spot to go when I want a swanky evening that feels elevated and sexy with immaculate vibes. The DJs mix records that have the perfect midtempo swag and the cocktails are all exceptionally well balanced.

For a Local Getaway

Hornby Island. I grew up going there as a kid and I’m always drawn back for the relaxed energy, the raw coastline and the island’s incredibly biophilic diversity. It has old-growth forests, grasslands and some of the softest sands on the West Coast.

For a Great Boutique Hotel

The Japanese-inspired bathhouse at Kitoki Inn on Bowen Island. Photo courtesy of Kitoki Inn.

Kitoki Inn is a minimalist Japanese-inspired bathhouse situated in the forest on Bowen Island. It’s peaceful and restorative, but book early because this gem books up faster than a Taylor Swift concert.