Lisa Vanderpump is lighting a new path towards success. The breakout star of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and Vanderpump Rules recently joined forces with designer Nick Alain to create a lighting collection that is at once romantic and industrial. The Home.com spoke exclusively with both Lisa Vanderpump and Nick Alain about their collaboration, their style, and where they find their inspiration.
The collaboration between Vanderpump and Alain was a match made in home furnishing heaven. “I’m passionate about design,” says Vanderpump. “The collaboration really works because when you meet somebody who has the same energy as you, and also we’ve done restaurants together… So I think together, we felt that we are very good at creating, I think that Nick brings a uniqueness to the design market.”
Alain recently designed Vanderpump’s latest bar, Tom Tom along with the Vanderpump Cocktail Garden at Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas. “We’ve had an amazing time,” says Alain. “We’ve done two restaurants in the last 18 months that have both been absolutely stunning ones.” Of the collaboration, Alain says: “They’re phenomenal people. It’s been a blessing to be able to get together with them.”
As for their design style: “It’s been pinpointed right now to romantic industrial,” says Alain. Vanderpump agrees: “I think we liked the juxtaposition between this kind of industrial feel, but with this romantic edge still having this kind of strong frameworks,” says Vanderpump. “But then you put in this beautiful crystal chandelier and it kind of softens the edges. It’s got a little industrial flare to it, which I love personally and then the romance of crystals is beautiful.”
Vanderpump credits her and Alain’s design success to a strong compatibility and shared aesthetic. “Nick and I share a compatible attitude towards design in that we like big statement pieces as well,” she says. “You see that with a lot of the lighting; you can take one piece and then you suddenly have a multiplication of that one piece times three, four, five, or seven and you have these huge statements.”
When it comes to size, the bigger, the better, says Vanderpump. “I think it’s about being bold in terms of size wise as well. I think people get scared and they think, oh, you know, is that going to be too big?” she says. “But if something’s beautiful, it can really kind of sometimes dominate the room. If it’s something beautiful, you want to look at it.”
As for inspiration, Vanderpump says that it doesn’t come from a solo source. “We get inspiration from so many different avenues,” she admits. “But I think it also comes from a frustration of what’s out there and trying to create something that’s individual and that nobody’s seen before really.”
In addition to size, color also plays an important role in the design. “What’s very clever is the color palette that Nick’s chosen,” says Vanderpump, who claims it’s not about what to create, but “having the discipline to stop ourselves. “You can have these kind of very neutral, the mirrors, the pewters, the brass, the gold, and then you can design the room around that.”
If you want to incorporate some of the Vanderpump/Alain style into your own home, Vanderpump advises to take size into consideration. “The mistake that people make in design from what I’ve seen is sometimes the proportions of things gets too bitty,” she says. “Rather than putting a piece here, a piece here, it’s just really being bold with your choices.”
“I would say a lot of the pieces in Nick Alain’s showroom and the Vanderpump Alain collaboration is really jewelry for the room,” says Vanderpump. “You can have a basic room and then, just like a beautiful woman, you put on a great piece of jewelry and it brings everything to life.”
