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Fulk, 48, is widely considered to be San Francisco’s secret social weapon. He’s the man trusted by society swells and Silicon Valley heavyweights alike to help plan perfect parties, decorate jaw-dropping homes or curate any aspect of their rarefied lives. “It’s great to have that tension between the original elements and the contemporary ones we added. It was a big responsibility to create something that feels aesthetically relevant at its core,” Fulk explains. In recent years, Ken Fulk has expanded his impact around the globe. In addition to current residential work from Mexico to Miami and Provence to Provincetown, Ken Fulk is making his mark in New York with a new concept for rental residences on West 38th Street, slated to open this spring.
Inspiring Design Projects by Ken Fulk
How Celebrity Designer Ken Fulk Creates Magical Spaces Inspired by Hollywood - Tatler Taiwan
How Celebrity Designer Ken Fulk Creates Magical Spaces Inspired by Hollywood.
Posted: Fri, 05 Aug 2022 07:00:00 GMT [source]
But what they dreamed of was far from a simple beach house; they wanted to create a truly remarkable destination that would be a draw for generations to come. For years my husband, Kurt, and I had rented an old camp on the north shore for two weeks in the summer and had developed a deep fondness for the place. At its core, however, the real pull for both of us is the otherworldly beauty, an ever-changing source of profound inspiration.
Designer Ken Fulk Choreographs a World All His Own
Just thumb through his new book, Mr. Ken Fulk’s Magical World (Abrams), for a peek inside some of the elaborate homes he has devised for Bay Area tech giants and entrepreneurs and a look at the Battery, a five-level private club he helped conceive. The book also offers a tableside view of some of the wild parties that have made him famous. In a nod to Truman Capote’s legendary black-and-white ball, he once hosted a masked affair where socialites and Silicon Valley magnates rubbed elbows with drag queens and leather daddies. For Napster cofounder Sean Parker’s woodland wedding, he draped shimmering streamers from the oldest redwoods in California. A counterpart to his four-story base of operations in San Francisco—dubbed the Magic Factory—the New York spot will provide a stylish anchorage from which Fulk can conduct business on the East Coast.
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There’s the living room, a low-slung oasis of statement furniture in outré yet cozy tones of salmon and hollandaise sauce. By the pool is a vintage-ish vignette, with striped umbrellas that conjure Patricia Highsmith by way of Palo Alto. The floral-curtained dining room channels an adolescent Diana Spencer until you notice the ornate marble slab that supports the table, designed by Italian architect Vincenzo de Cotiis.
Ken Fulk’s team is an agglomeration of the best of the best, with designers, architects, and even brand specialists. It’s more than just the setting, or the luxurious amenities, or the speed at which a club sandwich and a Diet Coke can be delivered to your room. A great hotel needs good energy—that hard-to-define feeling of being transported and delighted, but also very much at home. The Hamels and Fulk spent a few months after the fire assessing the situation, before beginning the literal process of clearing the ashes as the two-year project got underway. It was agreed that the home shouldn’t feel new, but instead a reinvention of the original structure—including a separate screening room and a wine cave. “Even though it’s been completely rebuilt, every space is filled with lots of meaning for them and for us,” says Fulk.
Designed like a boutique hotel with a lobby restaurant and rooftop lounge, the 224-unit building will offer residents a taste of Fulk’s extraordinary experiences, from interior design and party planning to weekly floral market and guest performances. He is renowned for his layered interiors and over-the-top parties. With a team of 50 “magic makers” to help bring his ideas to life, Fulk leads a team of architects, designers, branding and event specialists in both San Francisco and New York. Ken Fulk is an outstanding interior designer with a unique style to everything that he creates. He is renowned for his layered interiors, high-concept brand identities, and unforgettable parties. The duo tapped designer Ken Fulk, known for his ability to bring just the right amount of theatrics to comfortable, inviting spaces, to build out the 266-room property, which takes up an entire city block and also features a buzzy restaurant, Strawberry Moon, and a 30,000 square foot pool club.
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Take his longtime partnership with nightlife impresario David Grutman. Together, they have created the pastel-infused Swan restaurant, the whimsical Goodtime Hotel, and the recently opened, equally eclectic and singular Casadonna, all in Miami. Within a few months’ time, Kevin invited me up to see a spot he found on the north shore of the lake, just around the bend from where I had vacationed.
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“The same can be said with period rooms—how boring if we only filled them with priceless antiques.” To the designer, a successful room is “all about this tension between the expected and the moments of surprise.” Here are some of the most fearless ways he has mixed it up. Though it’s infused with a lively and inventive spirit, that’s not to say that Ken Fulk Inc. isn’t very much a business. In recent years, the firm has been exploring taking ownership stakes in its commercial projects (which range from a coffee company to an omakase sushi bar to several hotels). The practice, says Fulk, ensures that both his firm and their clients are completely aligned in their incentives. Room by room, Fulk pictured spaces that provide comfort, provoke conversation, and brook no cliché. “The whole house is a Looney Tunes ode to artisans and artists of all sorts,” he says.
Bathrooms are stocked with full-sized products from the Sicilian beauty brand Ortigia, which makes freshening up all the more pleasant. And, this being a city known for its nightlife, the windows are also fitted with highly effective blackout blinds. As one half of Dannijo, Danielle Snyder is used to designing as part of a team. Together with her sister, Jodie Morel, she has been concocting celeb-adored colorful jewelry (and now, clothing) since 2008. But when Snyder got married in 2019, she got a new creative partner in the form of her husband.
“I had never been trained as a designer,” Fulk points out, having instead graduated from the University of Mary Washington with a degree in English and history. “I never wanted anyone to tell me what kind of business I was supposed to have because it might limit me,” he adds. To inject the wonderland feel, they turned to San Francisco design impresario Ken Fulk, the man-about-town whose dapper suits and razzle-dazzle stagecraft have made him a West Coast favorite (just ask Instagram cofounder Kevin Systrom or Fulk’s newest BFF, Gigi Hadid). From flower delivery and party planning to nose-to-tail home design, Fulk’s decor “think tank” does it all. What’s more, he and his staffers do it themselves, designing and creating bespoke curtains, wallpaper, and furnishings for clients.
As with a number of residences designed by Callister, it blends midcentury modernism and traditional Japanese elements. The outdoor area features tiled “twin pools” connected by a runway and surrounded by retro-chic cabanas, where guests can enjoy cocktails in private. Years ago, while enjoying a bottle of Casa Grande on vacation in Mexico, my clients joked that it would make a great name for a getaway.
