Source: Architectural Digest
Like many interior designers, Rayman Boozer’s career was inspired by the pages of magazines. American Home, Apartment Life, and House Beautiful served as windows into another realm; Albert Hadley andSister Parrish were childhood heroes for a 10-year-old Boozer growing up in the country’s heartland. “Interior design was not a familiar industry growing up in Indiana,” Boozer tells AD PRO. “Even so, I would spend countless hours in my bedroom reading shelter magazines . . . I loved them all.” The early passion became a professional aspiration as Boozer studied interior design and fashion at Indiana University; after graduation, his move to New York led to work at a number of department stores. “I began to put my education to practice while working at Conran’s furniture store. It was there that I learned about branding and merchandising, and how essential presentation is to a creative business.”
But the experience also led him to realize a certain personality trait—a potential stumbling block: “I also discovered that I tended to be extremely shy, and that anxiety around customers is what kept me from pursuing interior design outright.”
Making the leap from retail employee to retailer wasn’t as challenging as drumming up the courage to jump from retail to design. “One day in 1994—very spur of the moment—I gave my two-week notice, and within a few months I opened Apartment 48, a home furnishing store in Chelsea. “48 was the original address on 17th Street,” Boozer tells AD PRO. “I thought that rather than designing other people’s spaces, I could put the effort into designing my own store, so I set the store up to look like an actual apartment, with vignettes replicating a living room, bedroom, dining room—et cetera.” The setup allowed Boozer to keep interactions to a minimum. “Customers could walk through my ‘apartment’ and simply purchase my aesthetic with just a few pleasantries exchanged.”
“I thought the idea was fantastic, but things were very slow for the first year. It seemed like the harder I tried, the worse things became. But eventually, customers began to return more frequently and magazines began to write stories. It seemed that once the press endorsed the shop, people constantly started to ask me to decorate for them.” Those increasing consumer inquiries, in the mid-1990s, provided a turning point for the hesitant designer: “Anxiety aside, I could no longer resist the demand, and I started to do full interior design projects under the Apartment 48 name.”
With the success of the store came his first interior design project, a studio apartment on 14th Street for one of the shop’s regulars. “We took his alcove studio and transformed it into a one bedroom, gutting the entire space and starting from the ground up. This was my first time managing a full renovation, and I was pleased to discover that the client interaction wasn’t as anxiety-inducing as I had thought. Though I do think that I held back a bit with my vision; the end result was exactly what the client wanted, but a bit muted for my taste. I was still developing the confidence to explain ideas to the client that might be slightly outside of their comfort zone. I think that’s a key part of my job: opening clients up to ideas they haven’t yet realized they want.”
Boozer’s retail business helped forge a path back to his early inspiration: magazines. In 1997, Time Out termed him “the color guru,” a nickname, based on his “perfect paint color” selection, that stuck. Then, in 2006, an Elle Decor cover “served as a major turning point in my career. The editor, Margaret Russell, also happened to be a frequent visitor at my store, and one day she asked to see some shots of my actual apartment. The images resonated. This one opportunity opened a lot of doors for me. Primarily, it provided validation that gave me the confidence and connections to expand my business.”
As designers know, major projects often follow major press. An influx of residential work following the Elle Decor cover meant Boozer was faced with the decision to close down the shop to devote his energies to design—and, particularly, over the last four or five years, to commercial work, like designing for production studios, and flagship offices. Also, in a homecoming of sorts, he’s now designing retail spaces: “While the spaces aren’t homes,” he reflects, “I still try to infuse the Apartment 48 spirit into every project I work on, whether that’s creating a relaxed eating space for tech employees or a luxurious lounge for celebrity guests. I’m particularly proud of our recent renovation of the Build Series studio and green rooms at 692 Broadway—it was exciting to match the electricity of the interview series with the latest wall coverings, an uninhibited color-scheme, and throwback vignettes.”
What’s the biggest lesson gleaned from the last 25 years in business? “To always follow the path of least resistance,” a learning that has been hard-won, says Boozer. “When I first opened my store, I would work seven days a week, nonstop. I was close to a breaking point when a friend recommended taking one day off a week. I can’t remember if I instantly understood, or perhaps I was just near exhaustion, but I closed up the shop on Mondays,” he recalls. “Looking back, it almost seems instantaneous: As soon as I stopped devoting 24 hours a day trying to ‘prove myself,’ things just became easier and everything started to flow naturally. It’s not always about putting in the most hours; sometimes it’s about putting in quality hours.”