Julianne Moore's Other Talent: Decorating!

It's not exactly tabloid fodder, but actress Julianne Moore has a secret: She decorates—and she's really good at it.

by Ruth Altcheck

Investing in a few good pieces and going cheap with the rest, actress Julianne Moore turned the bland, stark apartment of her stylist, Leslie Fremar, into a chic haven—on a $15,000 budget. Ask her about her design heroes and you’ll hear names like George Nakashima and George Nelson. Over the past 10 years, she’s honed her organic-modern style in six homes, plus the occasional friend-in-need rescue mission. Leslie Fremar’s NYC two-bedroom definitely fell into the latter category. “It looked like 1986,” Moore remembers. 

Though Fremar can dress top-notch stars like Jennifer Connelly and Maggie Gyllenhaal, she was clueless about furnishing her West Village rental. “I still thought shabby chic was the way to go, which is totally not my approach to fashion,” says Fremar, a devotee of forward-thinking labels like Marni and Dries Van Noten. Luckily, Moore had decisiveness enough for two: “Leslie is very confident about an outfit, while I’m very confident about an interior,” she explains. Together, they created a place with an easy urbanity worthy of Fremar’s inborn elegance.

Moore’s Law #1: Start with one special element

Moore based the apartment’s palette on a rug that Fremar had brought home from a trip to Morocco. The unusual pink-and-yellow pile was so lively on its own that they decided to go neutral elsewhere: a sophisticated purplish-gray for the walls and creamy white for the trim. Notes from nature—the wood coffee table, cork stools, a luxurious sheepskin throw—inject a layer of subtle texture.

Moore’s Law #2: Mix high and low

Nearly half of the apartment’s furniture came from big retailers like IKEA, which Moore swears by. The key to avoiding a generic appearance, she says, is to mingle mass-produced items with unique elements.

Moore’s Law #3: Let meaning be your guide

“This is a small space, so everything has to bring a lot to the party,” Moore says. When it came to colors for the bedroom, she sought fabrics that would express her client’s personality. The bold yellow drapes have a two-part reference, recalling a beloved Dries Van Noten coat and the curtains in Fremar’s parents’ home (“I made fun of them all through my childhood, but now love them,” she jokes). Accent pieces are similarly personal: The Hugo Guinness dove prints nod to the city’s lack of nature—and Moore’s own obsession with birds. “I wanted the place to feel like Leslie,” Moore says.

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