press

Boston Globe, G Force, “Home for the Holidays” Woman’s Day Special “Walls, Windows and Floors”

Boston Home + Garden magazine

Boston Globe

Boston Sunday Herald’s New England Living Section

Decorating Idea Book, Heather J. Paper, Taunton Home

NECN’s New England Dream House, Ask the Expert

Rhode Island Monthly, Design Awards judge

 TESTIMONIALS

This is my first ever review. And although I am a novice at writing reviews, I am not a novice at working with designers. Elissa Fenster is the crème de la crème. Needless to say, her aesthetic and eye are amazing. However it is all the other details that make her such a topnotch designer. She quickly cues into what you like and can gently prod you into considering extraordinary touches you would never have imagined. She has a warm, relaxed manner and handles the inevitable bumps in the road calmly and effectively. Her vendors are excellent. I can’t recommend her highly enough. My only regret is that I didn’t find her sooner!

– Lauri

Elissa Fenster is an amazing interior decorator! Her style, her taste, her ability to read exactly what the client wants and needs (even when the client is not so sure) is exceptional. My husband and I love working with her. She helped us transform a mini condo into a beautiful modern functional space for the two of us. She also has great contacts with incredible professional and tradesfolks. She respects your budget, time and personal taste. She is also terrific to work with. We like her so much, she is helping us with another completely different project and her work is equally beautiful. Highly highly recommend.

– Alexandra

Working with Elissa was terrific. We had never worked with an interior design professional, and Elissa’s calm and easy demeanor put us immediately at ease. But, more importantly, we quickly learned that she has an excellent eye and fabulous taste. She understood everything about our project, and shepherded it flawlessly from conception to realization, on time and within budget. Every one of her suggestions was spot on, and we ended up with a project we continue to marvel at and really love. All of the subcontractors she used were similarly professional, working in a timely fashion exactly as promised and within cost, making the whole project very easy and stress-free on our end. We would recommend Elissa very highly, and can’t wait to work with her again on our next project.

– Melissa

Elissa Fenster has fabulous style and creativity, as well as outstanding customer service. Every room in our Chestnut Hill, MA home has benefited from Elissa’s interior designs. Our most recent project included a kitchen remodel, an updated dining room and an updated den, all with spectacular results. Elissa’s deliverables such as room design, fabric selection, upholstery work, and the selection of art (just to name a few), are always beautiful, timely, and with attention to the client’s budget. I have worked with Elissa over many years and at least once a day I reflect on the enormous amount of beauty she has brought to our home. I highly recommend her.

– Maria

Elissa is the best! Over the past 10 years, I have called her for many projects – redoing all our bedrooms, freshening a dining room, renovating a second home, – everything from cool new pillows to window treatments to new living room chairs and lamps to custom headboards. She zeroes in on your taste, is back quickly with design suggestions and fabric/furniture options, stays on top of every aspect of the job, and has a great group of workman and vendors who do amazing work. She works within budget, and is terrific about repurposing what you already own. I keep coming back to her with all my design needs. She is never pushy, and will work tirelessly until she finds the “ perfect” item for you. I have recommended her to both family and friends and they all agree – she makes any decor project seamless from start to finish. I‘ve tried to do things on my own – hours online, running around to stores – and ended up frustrated and overwhelmed. Never again. I highly recommend Elissa Fenster !!

– Lynne

Elissa helped us with a basic but critical problem–color choices for both interior and exterior painting for an architecturally significant 110 year old house. She has tremendous ability to see effective color combinations that we never would have thought of on our own, and the results look so crisp and sophisticated. She quickly got a sense of what we were looking for and worked out a plan that we were very happy with. Visually, the effect pulls everything together with the right amount of accent and detailing.

She is happy to work on an hourly basis and will get the job done efficiently. It is a small extra cost to ensure you get the result you are hoping for.

– Roy

Elissa came over for a consult. So knowledgeable with scale, colors and layout. In a short time, she had terrific advice that we put right into action. Her experience with furniture quality, fabrication, and floor plan ensured the end result is exactly what we wanted. Her expertise was appreciated as she listened to our preferences and gave us recommendations that really fit! Highly recommend.

– M. Fallon

I have been Elissa’s client for eight years and she has always been a joy to work with. Whether the project was a small one (having pillows made to change the look of one of my sofas) or a more extensive undertaking (new furniture, pillows, paint, and lighting for my living room), Elissa has always been a wonderful listener and respectful of my ideas and requests while gently guiding me toward more workable and more attractive solutions to my design challenges (e.g. a relatively small living room and an eclectic art collection that sometimes needs to be reigned in). In the end, Elissa’s suggestions for a more streamlined aesthetic and for specific furniture pieces and lighting fixtures enhanced my home immeasurably. (Elissa is familiar with all the vendors at the BDC as well as an endless number of websites that offer a wide variety of styles of lighting, furniture, fabrics, etc.). She has great taste, is creative, is always responsive to my e-mails and phone calls, and always stays within my budget. In a word, Elissa is terrific! I highly recommend her and her services as an interior designer.

– June

When I first met Elissa, she immediately put me at ease with her warmth, respectful nature, confidence and great sense of humor. This was just the beginning of getting to know her, because after 2 complete bathroom renovations and an elaborate home renovation which involved her choosing everything from the color of the outside of our house, to flooring, stains, lighting, room color choices, furniture and even adjustments to architectural plans, I’ve come to appreciate her professional side. She is bold, original, decisive, creative, graceful, organized and budget conscious. Coming up with the solution of using glass instead of traditional stair railings and also an accent wall of grasscloth for the entry were dazzling and dramatic choices that I love and never would have thought of. We always get comments from friends about how much they loved “what we did”.

I just started a new project with Elissa this week, a laundry/bathroom. Currently, it’s a very poorly designed, old room that hasn’t changed since the house was built in the 1960’s. I’m thrilled and confident that Elissa will once again wow me with her magic touch.

– Betsy

I first worked with Elissa Fenster 12 years ago when I hired her to help me finish furnishing our new family room. I had never used a designer, and as usual, had spent months by myself shopping for a new sectional sofa. My relief at finally finding the right one was short-lived, however, when I quickly realized that now I had to spend months more looking for a coffee table, end tables, lamps, a rug, window treatments, and who knew what else. It was clear to me that it would be longer than my husband and I were willing to wait to have a room we could simply live in and enjoy.

By a stroke of good fortune, I found Elissa and the “fit” was perfect. She came aboard and helped me pull the room together in a fraction of the time I could have done it myself. What a pleasure to relax in a room that was done rather than trying to relax in surroundings that transmitted all the agitation of a work-in-progress. My husband and I were so thrilled with the results, that we had Elissa bring her talents to the rest of the house, as well.

Recently, when we felt our tastes changing and wanted a quieter, more spare environment, we engaged Elissa again. We knew she could bring our vision to life in a way that not only highlighted her well-developed sense of style but that also reflected who we were and how we lived our life.

I am as pleased this time around as I was the first — maybe even more so. As before, Elissa is willing to collaborate. She continues to encourage and welcome suggestions/opinions from me and uses them as guidelines to fine-tune the direction in which we are headed. She explains from a design or a practical point of view why something does or does not work. Knowing the “why” eliminates second guessing on my part and leaves me totally comfortable with the decisions we make. I like that. Elissa is respectful of budgetary constraints and is able to prioritize and direct our dollars to where they matter most.

Elissa has built up an impressive list of trades people, crafts people and vendors with whom she has established working relationships. She knows their work, and they know her standards. She has a sense of their work schedules, anticipates who we’ll be needing and books them in advance. All of this makes for a smooth work flow with few, if any, delays or surprises.

Understandably, Elissa has a large clientele, but she is always responsive to questions and concerns in a timely manner and keeps the project moving at a pace that is comfortable for her client.

– Satro