One of the designer’s main goals was to make each space conducive to entertaining and create a seamless flow,
both inside and out, for the homeowners and their family.
years, adding a warehouse and retail
store to their Athens design studio.
They now have 12 designers working
with them and have expanded to
Charleston, S.C.
One of their latest projects brought
them to Lake Oconee. Paul and
Johnnie Nussbaum, of Maryland,
wanted their new lake house in
Reynolds Lake Oconee to have
the same coziness as their current
home, but not feel like a stereotypical
“lake house.” – nothing nautical
or coastal and nothing to traditionally
40 LAKE OCONEE LIVING | FALL 2022
Southern.
For Jade, it was music to her ears.
“I’m a rule breaker. I always have
been and so is Graham, actually,”
says Jade. “We are very irreverent in
our designs, meaning that I blend a
European kind of Southern sophistication
with a lot of soul into my
design.”
For Jade, she doesn’t like anything
to be one tone, anything that is boring,
or anything that is “precious.”
“I want all the rooms that I design
to be interesting, evocative, and pull
out emotions in you, whether it be
‘Oh that’s a lovely room,’ or ‘Wow,
this is a cool space,’ but you actually
have a feeling to them – a soul to
them,” says Jade. “I’m really more
contemporary than most Southern
designers.”
But ultimately, she says, she’s just
the storyteller. “I can have all these
wild ideas, but it’s about what the
client wants and we really pride ourselves
on listening to our clients.”
Once the owners and designers
were on the same page, it was time