Interior designer and blogger Julie Paulino has a home that could make for a real-life Pinterest board. Dominican Republic-born and New York City raised, Paulino’s life and career have taken her across the world, and in early 2018, she settled into a quiet Dublin neighborhood with her husband and 9-year-old son.
Paulino first moved to NYC in her teen years, where she developed an appreciation for diversity and different perspectives.
“I think the way that influences me is by giving me a broader understanding of style and design, and apply that to jewelry or interior design,” she says.
It’s in this city that she studied interior architecture and interior design at the Parsons School of Design, and in 2006 started one of the first NYC-based interior design blogs, Belle Vivir.
In the thick of her interior design and blogging career Paulino stepped away to focus on her family, settling in Sao Paulo, Brazil for three years and Munich, Germany for two. But the break lead to another creative passion for Paulino, the launching of her architecture-inspired jewelry line, Tyche Jewelry.
Paulino’s online following has grown out of the once-uncharted world of blogging and into the social media era. Her Instagram page has nearly 8,000 followers, while on Pinterest she boasts a modest 73,000 followers. Her page is a carefully curated array of design inspirations, tips and trends, and grand trips with her family.
Also featured is the progress she has made on her own home. Built in the 1970s, the home was fixed in time, with wall-to-wall carpeting and a continuous wood panel theme. So far Paulino has just completed architectural design work on the house, trading the wood panels for pristine white walls and the carpet for imported tile and hardwood floors.
For Paulino, the best clients are the “Architectural Digest” educated and Pinterest savvy: “People are much more conscious and more informed about design,” she says. “They have a better perspective. They know what they want, so it’s good to work with those kinds of clients.” The favored hands-on clientele could also be the inspiration for a newer service Paulino offers called “e-designs.” She offers to assist customers remotely by trading pins on Pinterest, allowing for clients to purchase and arrange her suggestions themselves.
Paulino says a common mistake people make in their own homes is adding space, thinking the more spare a space is the bigger it will look and forgetting functionality altogether. Her signature tagline, “Chic Comfortable Spaces,” is both a stylistic description and a philosophy in that regard. Her style incorporates functionality in tandem with what would be aesthetically pleasing.
“I think it’s about what the owner of a space needs. It’s more about the need of that family,” she says. “Of course it’s important how it’s gonna look, but the most important thing is to fulfill those needs. Because design is about facilitating the life of people, not just making it pretty.”
Find more information on Julie Paulino and her designs on her website and blog.