Condo

After Marilou's 40-year marriage ended, she wasn’t sure if she'd be able to afford to live alone, but with careful planning she was able to buy a little one-bedroom condo in a town in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Dana and Andy first fell in love with this condo's vintage charm, and have appreciated all the work they did to make the space a comfortable home for their family, which now includes a young son. "Our condo has been a wonderful, cozy refuge," Dana writes.

"As a first-time homeowner I was excited to make my mark in a way that I was never able to do when renting. I love the simplicity and brightness of Scandinavian design, but also bright colors and pop art," writes Jen.

Shaelynn lives with her husband and their two cats in their Montana condo. He loves Japanese design and architecture. And she is drawn to a Scandinavian sleek look. Together they brought the designs that bring them happiness to form one uniform home.

Allison knew she could add character and color to her condo through the decor, and began with a few paint colors to set the tone, eventually layering in pattern and decor to create a home full of personality.

Designer and vintage Instagram shop owner Giovanna Macejka leaned into a "maximalist 1970s retro vibe that relies heavily on mixing patterns and textures, going bold with color, and creating movement throughout the space."

Lauren Maxey spent several weeks renovating this condo before moving in, including building the mantel and shiplap wall above the fireplace, adding peel-and-stick wallpaper to the bathroom, DIYing a dining banquette, and more.

Melanie is a single mom of five, and she and her two youngest kids moved into this home during the pandemic. While it was the smallest space they've ever lived in, they were able to choose pieces that made the space feel bigger and represent their heritage.

Hannah Mestyanek and her husband bring elements of their Southern California upbringing as they start a family in this Chicago condo.

This penthouse suite in Toronto is a perfect mix of sunny, airy, eclectic, and mid-century.

From the light pouring into the apartment to the natural textures and neutral colors, Sara and her wife's condo has majorly zen, calm, boho vibes — especially the relaxation room.

Interior designer Ryan Black incorporated family heirlooms and antique pieces from Asia and Europe along with a mix of modern design elements to create an eclectic, worldly feel in Jean-Francois Alix's newly purchased condo.

It has the most calming and airy vibes — and some very luxe details.

Previously, Rosemary has gravitated toward a more vintage MCM aesthetic, but that didn’t feel like the right match for the ultra-'90s architecture of her condo, so instead she's embracing a more Miami Modern/Art Deco revival look.

Laura is a pro at designing and optimizing small spaces, and lives in this condo located in a 1909 Victorian building. And a clever dog crate camouflaging idea is just ONE of the great ideas you'll find in her home.

It has incredibly tall French doors and a potted cactus that stretches just as high.

Because Natalie Wong's condo in Los Angeles' Koreatown neighborhood was built in the 1930s, her interiors were heavily inspired by the Hollywood Regency era.

This black and red kitchen got a complete refresh thanks to paint, and now it's Nichol's favorite part of her condo.

Ryan's advice for creating a space you love? "Fill your space only with things you love and things that make you happy. Don’t get everything all at once, instead, collect as things enter your life."

With black and white star-patterned tiles, deep gray cabinets, a gorgeous leather ottoman, and natural wood tones throughout, Kailee's 588-square-foot condo has total Joanna Gaines vibes, much of which was achieved just by adding paint.

Think: Murky, earthy tones, with thoughtful pops of color and a mixing of wood tones and texture layers.

It also has loads of natural light, a custom-made bay window seat, and a private deck space transformed into a relaxing oasis.

Vintage fashion and home decor seller Barbie Roadkill says her Chicago condo's style is: "Golden Girls' meets Lydia’s house in 'Beetlejuice' meets a box of crayons."

Arabella and Ben's unit was all beige and cheap brass fixtures when they moved in, so they updated light fixtures, demoed the bathroom, and painted the walls by hand to create the home of their dreams.

Gizelle was raised on PBS period dramas, but until she gets to live in a traditional English manor home, she's furnished her industrial modern Chicago loft with antiques to blend in British colonial design inspiration.

Sarai Reed, April Lawrence, and their dog, Lambo Reed-Lawrence, share this small one-bedroom condo. Their style is equal parts mid-century modern-inspired, uncluttered, and full of plants, which translates very nicely into a style you could call Lush Minimalism.

Heidi's small condo is a balance of things she's been collecting for years, an ever-revolving jungle of plants, and recently found objects that speak to her sense of home.

Rachele's living room doesn't get a lot of natural light, but she embraced the darkness and chose a dark blue to make it even cozier.

Sheta Chatterjee, who works in user experience design at a tech company, shares this 823-square-foot condo in San Francisco with her cute pup, Stanley.

This home already had tons of charm, like lots of windows, great molding, and cute built-ins. The designer and homeowners worked to allow those elements to shine when they refreshed this condo.

Logan has been woodworking since childhood, and together with Maria's knack for plants and antiques, they've DIYed and designed a relatively small space while turning it into an incredibly cozy and comfortable home.

There are lots of plants, which bring life into a small space, and a mix of materials, like brick, light wood, and darker wood.

Justine introduced pops of color by painting walls with bright colors to complement an open layout. "I specifically wanted to do color blocking on our walls to create an imaginary border between the different areas of our space."

Kristin and Joel splashed color on all the walls, added a couple murals, painted the kitchen cabinets, tile-stenciled the cement floors, added molding to doors and swapped all the lighting, faucets, and doorknobs to make this space fully their own.

These podcasters and founders of an events company consider the dining room table as the anchor oftheir home... and it's now has become their podcast recording studio, too. "In many ways, this is the space where we can still bring people together and now instead of feeding their mouths, we are feeding their spirit with inspiration."

Sarah describes her studio apartment as a mini palace. "It has the regal feel of a a kingdom (very much inspired by Palace of Versailles), the allure of a Parisian apartment on a summer afternoon, with a rich and luxurious decadent decor."

Mariana's condo is new construction and initially lacked architectural charm, but she brought life into the space by mixing her own paint colors, sourcing things secondhand, using what she already had, DIYing what she didn’t, and investing in a few things that could really make a difference.

Kelsie bought this condo after the end of a long term relationship and has spent the last one and a half years turning this into a dream cocoon.

Designer Julie Mitchiner didn’t want to take away from the character of this classic Chicago home or its great architectural bones, but still wanted to make it their own. She accomplished this feat with paint, wallpaper, and other DIY design elements.

Nayana used white marble contact paper on the counters and removable white subway tile backsplash in her dark rental kitchen to brighten up the space.

While Shruti's style is bold and dramatic, her husband, Madhukar, prefers a calm and relaxed space. The couple has managed to strike a good-looking balance in their new condo.

When Manuel and Javier first bought this small Bueno Aires condo, it DID NOT look like the lovely and airy space that it is today.

Nicole Lockhart calls her small studio's style "Urban cowgirl’s world traveling retreat".

This maximalist condo is proof that thrift stores and estate sales are great places to find cool pieces for your home.