These gray, short days and long, dark nights of winter make sources of warmth and comfort a priority.
Those sources can be simple ones: a good book; a nice glass of wine or a soothing cup of tea; maybe a good, old-fashioned, feel-good movie. If you’re like many, just being a couch potato under an afghan doesn’t do the trick. The best place to snuggle and hibernate on these long winter nights, solo or with your better half, is the coziest space in the house – your bedroom.
Our bedrooms are our most personal havens. While a home’s public rooms are considered to be the living room, dining room, family room, kitchen, bar, or even library, the master bedroom is often off limits to visitors. The privacy of the space is key to its sense of intimacy and comfort.
A great bed, of course, is the heart of the room. Other furnishings – from a comfortable chair in a designated reading nook to ample dressers and bureaus to favorite photos, paintings and accessories – all contribute to the special feeling of your haven.
Much as you love it all, there may be an aesthetic component missing which ties it all together – and that can be custom-designed bedding, accessories and coordinated window treatments. That’s where Kim Updegraff, the owner of Shade Tree Interiors in Sinking Spring, can provide the missing pieces of the puzzle.
A Happy Passion
“I think we want our homes to make us happy,” says Updegraff. “Creating that environment, working with clients, is very personal.”
For Updegraff, the love of design and an affinity for creativity has been a lifelong passion. She combines that with a seasoned business background.
The Governor Mifflin High School graduate went on to earn a master of business administration degree from Pennsylvania State University. After seven years with US Air and then about double that time as a financial analyst for Penske Logistics, she stepped into an entirely different professional role.
“This is a 180 from what I used to do,” she says. For a few years, she owned the local franchise of V2K Décor and More. Her business background and acumen, along with her creative flair, helped her grow an enviable client base. After her five-year franchise contract ended, Updegraff set out on her own. With a new business location just down the street, she established Shade Tree Interiors.
Truth be told, Updegraff’s firm specializes in custom window treatments.
“I always did my own curtains, my own window treatments,” she says. “Even in high school I did a lot of sewing. I always had a special interest in custom window treatments and made them for my first home. I believe they have the most impact on a room.”
That impact, she says, can be especially significant when it comes to marrying bedding, accessories and window treatments in master bedrooms.
The Order of Things
Ironically, while most choose a paint color and then plan a room’s décor around it, Updegraff contends that’s doing things backwards.
“Find your leading fabrics first,” she says, “and then pick a paint color.”
Helping folks create their perfect bedroom escape means that Updegraff is on the road a lot. Her client base extends from Berks to the Philadelphia metro areas of Montgomery and Chester counties. She also has performed her decorating magic on clients’ beach homes along the Jersey shore.
Updegraff understands what passing over that bedroom threshold means.
“When people invite you into their home, that creates a more intimate relationship,” she says.
During that initial visit, she assesses the space and lifestyle of the inhabitants.
“Whatever the décor is, it needs to work functionally,” she says. “If pets sleep on the bed, well, then don’t get the white duvet.”
She is determined that clients be as specific as possible in explaining their tastes and choices – and if it’s a couple’s bedroom, that both partners are active decision makers. She takes her role as a consultant seriously – and she’s not a yes man, well, woman.
A Guiding Hand
“I’m very cautious,” she says. “At the end of the day, it’s their home, and I wouldn’t discourage them if they clearly love something. However, I’m not going to let them make a mistake if I think colors don’t go together.
“Sometimes I get: ‘Well go ahead and design it.’”
That latter statement puts up some professional red flags for her. In her undergraduate years, Updegraff minored in psychology. Knowing how comforting a home environment must be from an emotional level, questioning and understanding the client is critical to the design process.
“I think I’m good at honing in on personal style,” she says.
Master bedrooms, usually with an en suite master bath, are best tackled as a coordinated project, she says.
She comes back armed with ideas and often a swatch- and accessory-filled catalog by Eastern Accents, a Chicago-based manufacturer of bedding, accessories and soft home furnishings. Updegraff particularly likes the firm because of its quality products that are all American made.
Utilizing both catalogs and websites, Updegraff guides clients through styles, textures and colors that match their preferences and lifestyles.
From the bedding to coverlets, duvets, complementary pillows, upholstered benches shoe-storage ottomans, and window treatments, the coordinating fabrics bring a room together in accordance with the clients’ most personal requests and tastes.
And there can be a number of coordinating fabrics and accents on just one object. An example from her showroom: an accent pillow with two different fabrics and two coordinating trims. With coordinating materials at hand, a company like Eastern, she says, can offer cost-effective custom items.
Ideas, Trends, Reality
Time, like money, is an investment when working with a decorator in customizing your bedroom.
“Generally, when it comes to the materials, from ordering to delivery, there is a five-week lead time,” she says. In the busy, pre-holiday season, that lead time can be even longer.
Simpler styles and an abundance of neutrals tend to be trending in bedroom décor, she says. Roman shades and simple linen panels, often with a decorative tape accent along a lead edge, are increasingly popular window treatments. Motorized shades, especially for individuals sensitive to light or who work night shifts and sleep in daylight hours, are becoming more common.
“Gray is very popular, and I don’t see it going away any time soon,” she says. “I’m seeing grays with pops of green, grays with turquoise accents. I do a lot of neutrals, monochromatic color schemes.”
Retailers like Restoration Hardware, Pottery Barn and Ballard Designs often provide inspirations for her customers, she says. Updegraff’s client base segues a bit from those influenced by HGTV shows and trends.
“I think those viewers are more the DIYers,” she says. “They see the concept and go do it themselves.”
Her clients, she says, often refer to Houzz.com, a website started by a home remodeling couple which now boasts the involvement of more than 40 million homeowners, design enthusiasts and improvement professionals. Among the more than 17 million images on the site are contributions from celebrities in the entertainment and sports worlds.
Clients, she says, more or less assemble a collection of those they like best, and that can be a strong starting point for the bedroom decorating process.
Something for Everyone
Costs just for custom bedding can reach $2,000, says Updegraff. Add custom window treatments and accessories and that might double. In fact, she just completed a full bedroom redesign that totaled more than $4,000.
There have been projects that exceeded that fee. One was outfitting a nearly 1,000-square-foot master bedroom (in a 10,000-square-foot house) that included a living room area and a coffee bar.
She’s done custom treatments for an Oley-area media room that cost in excess of $7,000 for one giant flank of French doors, side and top windows that required an enormous arched rod made in Argentina to support the high-end curtains and swags.
But those high-end projects should not discourage folks of more modest means from reaching out to designers.
For long-time clients who have downsized to retirement communities like The Highlands in Wyomissing and Oakshire Senior Apartments in Reading’s Glenside neighborhood, smaller-scale, affordable custom window and bedding treatments help seniors with the adjustment from a beloved home.
On the other end of the age scale, she’s done clients’ children’s and teens’ bedrooms.
Again, grays trend, often mixed with subtle hues of pink, yellow or tangerine. Bright colors mixed with bold patterns pop as well, and poufs and Lucite chairs can be incorporated for extra seating.
Wallpaper – on an accent wall – in either subtle or bold patterns can express a blooming personality. And crisp whites or neutrals mixed with bold pops of color offer interesting backdrops for a growing child.
Keeping cost in mind, Updegraff is able to help a client find gorgeous bedding even in a local department store.
“I don’t work with just high-end clients,” she says. “I try always to have something to offer someone to work with. Everybody deserves to treat themselves.”
Challenging Work
That also includes folks dealing with disabilities. A custom dust ruffle for a lift bed? Updegraff has created one recently, to a client’s delight.
“I worked with the builder, and there were challenges design-wise,” she says, “but it was a great family to work with. That was one of my most fulfilling projects.”
Updegraff estimates her customer base at about 2,000. Many are regular – or repeat – clients whom she’s served for years.
“I’ve seen their life changes, seen them raise their kids, seen some downsize,” she says. Indeed, some of those “kids” are now clients.
Updegraff’s design team includes a number of subcontractors, including a valued installer who has worked with her for a dozen years, and one part-time office assistant who handles, among other things, her shadetreeinteriors.com website, Facebook page, monthly newsletter and other attendant social media.
“I like the business aspect of this,” she says. “All my work is sent out, and coordinating a project is invigorating.”
She takes special delight in the most challenging jobs for her team – like designing, making and installing 20-foot color block curtains in an ultra-modern, multi-level, open-concept home outside Philadelphia.
“They were all motorized,” she says. “Those jobs are a little stressful. There are nights I don’t sleep before installation, but I like the problem-solving aspect of it.”
But when it comes to designing a bedroom, dressing the bed itself and the attendant furnishings and accents, the ultimate goal is a comfortable haven for many good nights of sleep.
Her website provides lots of inspiration, but Updegraff also offers some tips for a quick and effective bedroom mini-transformation.
“I believe pillows are an easy way to change a room. HomeGoods is a good source. Coordinate paint with fabrics – changing colors of a room can have a huge impact,” she says.
“I think adding draperies can soften a room, make it look a bit dreamy, and that can be made even better with lamps that change the ambiance. An area rug – even if it’s placed on carpet – can define a space and make it cozier.”
Shade Tree Interiors
3461 Penn Avenue, Sinking Spring
610.678.1221
