Suite Inspirations

As business travel and media coverage attract a growing number of people to visit exotic destinations around the world, U.S. designers are increasingly being asked to recreate rooms to reflect these exotic locales – and include all the luxury hotel-style amenities.

This appears to be especially true of the master suite, which has become a refuge for homeowners. "It's their own suite, and I'm referring to the presidential suite in the best hotels," comments Peter Ross Salerno, CMKBD and owner of Peter Salerno, Inc., in Wyckoff, NJ.

"People are now doing what the Astors and the Vanderbilts used to do years ago – travel the world, pick up things for the home along the way, and bring them back," he observes.

In fact, this trend has opened up a whole new world of design – and profit – possibilities for kitchen and bath designers. After all, if they're going to design an opulent master bath, why not coordinate a whole master suite incorporating the same exotic theme?

The client benefits from design continuity and the designer's overall skills with such key aspects as great, well-organized storage and a spa-like, luxury escape vibe. And designers can expand into new venues that add profits – and opens up new work without having to find new clients.

However, while kitchen and bath designers certainly possess the knowledge and skills to handle master suites, to be truly successful, they also need to be keyed into the trends, which are somewhat broader than those found in the master bath alone.

For instance, influences for master suite designs are increasingly coming from the Far East and Old Europe – areas known for their opulent design.

Gavriella Fiedler, president, Interior Dimensions, Inc. of in Harrisburg, PA, notes that she is currently working with a couple who favor designs that are very ornate. "What they were showing me was very Tuscan, very Mediterranean," she says, "so I designed the suite so that, when you go into the bath from the bedroom, you go through these two arches with wrought iron gates as if you're stepping out onto a Mediterranean terrace."

Fiedler notes that she likes to use materials in an unusual way, and the wrought iron in the master suite is one example of that. "You wouldn't normally think of using it in an interior, but it's one way to separate the two rooms yet still keep the space open."

The interest in luxurious amenities is just one element that kitchen and bath designers can use to extend out from the master bathroom into the bedroom and other areas of what now encompasses a master suite.

Many people, when designing or renovating a master bedroom area, have a long wish list, and designers need to look at how to fulfill those lists in total, not just in the bath.

"It used to be that when you talked about a master suite, there was a bed and a luxurious bath," comments Salerno. "Now, it's a luxurious complex, some that are from 1,000 to 1,500 sq. ft. They include a sitting room with a fireplace, a bedroom with a fireplace, and a bath with a tub and a fireplace behind it."

"A lot of the homes that I do are renovations of older homes, where the standards for a master bath used to be so different. Some of them are the size of a closet with one sink and a toilet. Now, people are willing to spend money on increasing the size and overall feel of the space," comments Fiedler, who sees this as an opportunity for kitchen and bath designers to generate greater profits by doing these larger, full master suite jobs.

But while clients understand the overall feeling they want from the space, putting the whole thing together is quite another story. "Something that I hear often is 'I know what I like, I just don't know how to put it together.' And I say that's great, because it's why people like me have a job," stresses Fiedler.

The first thing that many designers question is what the client wants, and the amount of space with which to work. Often they end up stealing space from other rooms to add sitting areas and centrally located closets or dressing rooms.