After years of renting a home and separate workspace, ceramicist Gabrielle Silverlight and her guitar pedal designer husband Brian Hamilton of smallsound/bigsound decided to buy a house. They found a cute one in Philadephia’s Fishtown neighborhood with an attached garage that they are in the process of turning into a work studio, showroom, and retail space they’ll be calling SOUND//OBJECTS. They hope to be ready in the next year or two, but until then, they decided to “move here in the interim to consolidate our lives and affectionately call this our ‘Limbo Loft.'”

My Style: Planty!, eclectic, creative, channeling California and Miami vibes, we’re by no means minimalist but desire to create a space that has a sense of calm and allows each object to breathe.

Inspiration: Much of the inspiration for our space comes from our respective mothers. Gabrielle’s mom is super artistic with a great eye for interior design, has a passion for DIY touches including reupholstering and refinishing furniture, and has always created spaces that are elegant and refined, yet inviting and comfortable. Brian’s mom is more of a minimalist but has an impressive collection of extremely well-cared for plants, some of which she’s had for over 20 years.

Favorite Element: The high ceilings and large, south-facing windows, all of the objects that were created by our friends, peers, and artists we admire and of course, the plants.

Biggest Challenge: Living and working in a single room without closets has been the most difficult thing to balance, especially since we strive to create healthy separations between the individual spaces while keeping them feeling open and clutter-free.

Some challenges have been met with fun solutions as well. We love having friends over for dinner parties but don’t have enough table space and chairs for a large group of people so we decided to start having “picnic dinners.” We move the plants that are in the middle of the room to the side, throw down some extra rugs and fabric on the floor, and have cozy, quirky gatherings that work even with over 20 people in here!

What Friends Say: Mostly “that’s a lot of plants!” and that our space is pretty calming.

Biggest Embarrassment: Basic rental-grade laminate counters, cabinets, fixtures, etc. We could easily upgrade those things but would prefer to invest more into our future home.

Proudest DIY: Since we both own and operate our own creative businesses out of our space, this is a very easy question to answer. Both of us have backgrounds that greatly inform our work (Gabrielle’s in glass and sculpture and Brian’s in sound design and performance) but are both mostly self-taught in our respective crafts of ceramics and guitar pedals.

Biggest Indulgence: Plants, fresh flowers, music equipment, good Amish butter, Fernet, and staying in bed too long in the morning to snuggle with our cat Miss Mabel.

Best Advice: Get more plants! They will almost immediately brighten up your space and mind and learning to care for them is not as hard as it sometimes seems. A small amount of research and trial and error can help you find the right plant for your particular space and lifestyle, especially regarding the amount of light and water it will need. We also often get asked how we deal with our cat(s) and our plants. Luckily Miss Mabel is uninterested in plants or getting into mischief at all. On the other hand, Zolaska, our beloved and recently departed cat, needed certain plants to be placed out of reach because he would try to eat them. If you have a pet that is adamant about going after a plant, always choose your pet over the plant!

We know Marie Kondo is all the rage right now, but we think it’s true that while one doesn’t have to be minimalist, it helps to only keep things around that make you feel good or are functional. Objects can bear weight and take up space both physically and mentally so meaningfully choosing what you keep around you makes for a less cluttered home and mind. The William Morris quote, “Have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful,” has always rung true as well.

Dream Sources: Oxford Street Furniture’s new line, especially their Walnut and Bleached Ash Dining Chairs, vintage MCM furniture, rugs by Dana Haim http://www.danahaim.com/ Phaedo Design’s mirrors and sculptural room screen would be amazing to have in our future studio space, Lighting by In Common With www.incommonwith.com an original painting by Jeremy Miranda www.jeremymiranda.com/ (we have some small prints) and always dreaming about custom concrete, stone and tile and gorgeous hardware for our new home!

→ Enter APARTMENT15 at checkout for a 15% discount on all orders for the next two weeks (through May 7) at Gabrielle Silverlight’s online shop.

PAINT & COLORS

Benjamin Moore’s Winthrop Peach on the dividing wall into the studio and lofted storage space wall & striped mirror

ENTRY

Iceberg Painting — James Lipovac

Under the stairs has become our small dressing area/open closet. A friend gave us the large clothing rack and we placed an antique cabinet that Gabrielle’s mom refinished under the stairs that holds our clothing. Having this small and open space has made us more deliberate about what clothing we choose to keep and buy.

Mirror with hooks — Home Goods

This and the cabinet top holds Gabrielle’s collection of bags. Some vintage and lot of them are from BAGGU, I (Gabrielle) didn’t set out to collect so many but I love their colors and minimal designs. —

LIVING ROOM

Sofas — Right before we moved into this loft we got rid of our old sofa. While dropping off some donations to our local thrift shop, Circle Thrift, a truck from the store pulled up that just came from picking up furniture at an estate. When they opened the door we spotted these petite velvet sofas and knew they had to be ours! Luckily Brian happened to know someone who worked there and we were able to arrange to buy them before they put them out in the store, it was perfect because we already had a moving truck rented for our move to transport them in. We also got some info about where they came from—an older couple who was moving who both had double PhDs—we joke that we have very smart sofas!

Pillows — vintage Kilim pillow from the Alameda Flea Market in California, Sage Velvet pillows from IKEA and Circle pillow Gabrielle made

Black Stripe Wall Vessel — Gabrielle Silverlight

Lamp — West Elm

Side Table — Jinxed

All ceramics on table — Gabrielle Silverlight

Rug — Vintage. We got married on this rug! It was under our feet at our ceremony.

Marionette — I’ve had this since I was a child, her name is Rosa!

Miss Mabel’s tee-pee at top of stairs — Loyal Luxe

DINING ROOM

Planter — HEYPACE

Pink Dish — Joseph Pintz

Coasters — Abacá Store

Dining Room Table — Vintage from Mid Century Furniture Warehouse

Chairs — Vintage

Credenza — a Craigslist find and added half circle pulls custom made by Oxford Street Furniture

On credenza is a collection of photos from childhood, our cats, polaroids from our wedding that Photographer Amanda Brubaker took, and our wedding invitation that Gabrielle drew and we worked together to create the layout. There is also a photo of Gabrielle’s father Barry Miles from when he was 12 years old (the photo was from a Premier Drums endorsement ad) He was a child prodigy and is an amazing musician.

Eye Dish — Demetria Chappo Ceramics

Ceramic Vase — Gabrielle Silverlight

Speakers — Tivoli

Hanging Light — IKEA

Rattan Shelf Unit — Craigslist

KITCHEN

We took some of the cabinet doors off to create a somewhat open shelving area with easy access to our most used kitchenware. Plus, the less ugly cabinet fronts we have to look at the better 😉

Wall Shelf — This shelf holds a collection of mugs that are from ceramicist friends and makers that Gabrielle has done trades with or bought directly from the maker or a small boutique. The center vase and few of the cups were made by Gabrielle. It’s so nice for us and our guests to get to choose a special handmade mug for morning coffee.

Wood Planter Box — Oxford Street Furniture

Fruit Bowls— HEYPACE Ceramics

Striped Arch Vessels — Gabrielle Silverlight

Salt Jar — Jeremy Ayers

Sugar Pot — Hasami Porcelain

Salt and Pepper Grinders — Menu

Shrimp Sculpture — Nic Annette Miller

Sink Cleaning Brush Holder — Gabrielle took a piece of driftwood and added hooks to create a place to hold our cleaning brushes, she also made the ceramic sponge holder and soap dish.

Green and White Vase — Carnevale Clay

Monstera Leaf Charm and Trivets on Stove — Gabrielle made these for our wedding for displaying some of the appetizers on.

Pink Dust Pan — Good Thing

Cutting Board — Facture Goods

Large Painting of Boxers — James Lipovac

Print on refrigerator — Isabelle Feliu

Tracing on refrigerator is of our cat Zolaska’s polydactyl mitten paws

BEDROOM

Rattan Screen — an Etsy vintage find

Blue Ceramic Wall Vessel — Gabrielle Silverlight

Rattan Butterfly Chair — Gabrielle’s mom found it on Craigslist, we used this and another one she got for our wedding reception chairs.

Creepy Animal Foot Stool aka Charles Jr. — Jinxed (our friend who worked there at the time thought I (Gabrielle) was joking when I said I wanted to buy it, but I fell in love with his terrifying little face the moment I saw him, plus he’s perfect for storing books on or putting your feet up onto when you’re on the couch.

Copper Pillows —West Elm

Circle Pillow — Made by Gabrielle

Duvet — In Bed Store

Blanket on bed — one of our favorite finds from the Alameda Flea Market in California

Lamps — Home Goods Store or a Ross’s (they happened to match great with the West Elm Lamp we already had in the living room)

Jewelry Dish on Nightstand — Gabrielle made it to hold our wedding rings at our wedding ceremony

Tapestry on wall over the bed — Block Shop

Circle Plant Stand — vintage find from a friend (think it could have been for a bird cage?)

Vintage Crystal Perfume Bottles — From Gabrielle’s grandmother

Planters on windowsill — Large White Ceramic Planter by HEYPACE, An assortment of Gabrielle’s ceramics and one IKEA planter

PLANT AREA BETWEEN BEDROOM AND KITCHEN

The large tree-like plant we recently acquired from Gabrielle’s grandmother, it’s at least 20 years old and we’ve been taking great care to get it acclimated to its new home.

A few of the larger pots are from ceramicist HEYPACE and a small one of Gabrielle’s is in there too.

Pink Marble and Gold Small Table — Jinxed

BRIAN‘S KEYBOARD NOOK-

Ceramic Pots on windowsill are mostly made by Gabrielle

Wooden Planter Box — Oxford Street Furniture

Trudeau Amplifier with 1×12 cabinet — Otis Amps

Vintage Minimoog Model D — Moog Music

Space Echo RE-201 — Roland

Skylark Amplifier — Gibson

Vintage Echoplex EP-3 — Maestro

200A — Wurlitzer

BATHROOM

Rug — We purchased this on a trip to Portugal in Óbidos

Wooden Planter Box — Our friends at Oxford Street Furniture made a whole bunch of these boxes for us for our wedding reception. The tables were lined with the fern filled planter boxes along with ceramic flower vases Gabrielle made.

Pink Dish — Andrew Molleur

Floral Inlay Dish — One of Gabrielle’s pieces from a few years back

Print across from shower — Isabelle Feliu

Print near window — Jeremy Miranda

Hand Towel Woman Hook — Kaye Blegvad

Himalayan Salt Night Light — Amazon

Shower Curtain — We couldn’t find a simple shower curtain we liked so Gabrielle took a mosquito netting curtain from IKEA and added with a liner for an airy look.

STUDIO

Shelving Units — IKEA

Record on Wall — Barry Miles (this is one of Gabrielle’s dad’s albums)

Phone on Wall — one of Gabrielle’s prized possessions her sister got from the Nevele Grande Hotel in the Catskills (after it had closed) It’s possible it is haunted with ghosts of the Borsht Belt’s past! 😉

Guitars — (Vintage MIJ Mustang, Squier Bass VI, American Telecaster) – Fender

Various Pedals — smallsound/bigsound

Paintings and Prints —

Bruce Mitchell

Jeremy Miranda

Zoárd Wells Tyeklár

James Lipovac

Laura Berger

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