Decorating & Design
Here Are The Canadian Design Pros To Watch In 2023
Updated on July 26, 2023
Our annual A-List highlights some of the most talented designers, architects, creators and retailers from across Canada. Here are the ones to watch in 2023!
Designer: Ashley Montgomery, Barrie, Ont.
Awash with earthy colors, eclectic textiles and bare woods, Ashley’s finely crafted spaces personify the new traditional look made popular by designers such as Amber Lewis and Heidi Caillier. Her rooms defy easy categorization: they’re at once traditional and contemporary, simple and layered, definitively Canadian but also globally recognized and adored.
Why Now: While the designer founded her company in 2013, she’s come into her own alluring style in recent months and, earlier this year, when she posted a photo of her own kitchen on Instagram, her following exploded to 93K, with big design names like Goop reposting the captivating space.
Ashley’s updated-traditional designs rely on calm, natural palettes. Brick, marble and woven textures bring a natural feel to a beautiful mudroom.
Unpainted wood features large in Ashley’s spaces; in her kitchen, she plays rugged beams and a dark island base against blond chevron-patterned flooring.
Designers: Kate Snyder and Jessica MacDonald, Studio Roslyn, Vancouver
The interior designers’ work has an eccentric point of view, referencing styles as diverse as Art Deco, Italian Modernism, Hollywood Regency and Postmodernism — sometimes all at once. They cite contemporary fashion as a huge influence, but their heady mashups are also backed by a keen architectural awareness for functionality.
Why Now: Accolades — including the Robert Ledingham Memorial Award for an Emerging Interior Designer in 2022 — have been pouring in for Kate (left) and Jessica, who met at architecture school in Manitoba, launched their studio just five years ago and now also offer a curated roundup of unique finds, plus their own home goods collection, via an online shop.
In this vacation home living room in Vancouver, furniture and flooring in muted patterns are juxtaposed with darker art and textiles that have more intricate detailing.
An edgy monolithic desk and retro-style, geometric drapes are balanced by sage-toned walls and upholstery.
Architect: Omar Gandhi, Halifax and Toronto
Architect Omar Gandhi has made a name for himself designing structures that celebrate the beauty of the landscape around them. His simple yet sophisticated approach has earned his studio awards including the Professional Prix de Rome in Architecture from the Canada Council for the Arts, and his Rabbit Snare Gorge cabin, perched above the sea in Cape Breton, won a Governor General’s Medal.
Why Now: Since he launched the firm in 2010, Omar’s work has been sought- after — recent projects include the accessible viewing platform at Peggy’s Cove, N.S., and a Corten steel–wrapped residence atop a rocky peak above B.C.’s Okanagan Valley. A new restaurant design for celeb chef Matty Matheson is garnering praise internationally.
Clean lines and stretches of white oak paneling give the OG House by Omar Gandhi’s firm an airy, modern look.
Architects: Renée Mailhot (left), Yannick Laurin (centre) and Sébastien Parent, La Shed Architecture, Montreal
Born from a shared passion for architecture, design and Montreal, La Shed fosters the ethos that good design shouldn’t be a luxury, and that working with an architect on your home should be as normal as using an accountant for your taxes. Our habitats, they say, need to address our lifestyles not only functionally, but also emotionally and intimately.
Why Now: The firm, founded in 2009 by Renée Mailhot (left), Yannick Laurin (centre) and Sébastien Parent, recently won an award from the Royal Architectural Institute of Canada and Canada Council for the Arts for its Les Rochers project, a pair of sleek, angular homes that rise from a grassy hillside near Havre-Aubert, in Quebec’s Magdalen Islands, sited to offer epic sunset views.
The striking Les Rochers residence offers views of the landscape and the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
Maker: Kate MacNeill, Concord Custom Lighting, Toronto
Lighting designer Kate MacNeill creates inspired bespoke pieces for high-profile clients in Canada and the U.S., as well as a collection of stunning ready-made contemporary designs popular with residential designers. Once she’s crafted a prototype, she works with a stable of local manufacturers to produce custom parts for lighting that’s entirely Canadian made.
Why Now: Launched just four years ago, Concord has already created distinctive lighting for Toronto’s Ritz- Carlton and Drake hotels, the Pendry hotel in Chicago, The Beach Motel in Southampton, Ont., and the buzzy new eatery Prime Seafood Palace.
A spherical sconce by Kate MacNeill in a guest room at The Beach Motel echoes the curves of the arched doorway.
Kate’s Pearl chandelier.
Maker: Kyle Parent, Vancouver
Vancouver textile artist Kyle Parent first transformed his childhood passion for sewing with his mother into a career as a clothing designer and tailor. More recently, he’s shifted into creating captivating quilts and pillows from found and remnant fabrics that feel more like art pieces than bedding.
Why Now: Kyle was tapped to design custom quilts for the much-anticipated Ace Hotel in Toronto; made of deadstock fabric dyed to meet the vision and direction of the hotel, the textiles bring just the right dash of colour and pattern to the crisp, minimalist spaces.
This quilt brings a dose of pattern to a guest room at the new Ace Hotel in Toronto.
Makers: Guy Ferguson (pictured) and Nathan Martell, Part & Whole, Victoria
The Part & Whole team has backgrounds in industrial design, fashion, photography, graphic design and furniture retail, and they all hail from the Pacific Northwest. Based on an ideology of “universal interconnectedness,” the brand’s contemporary furniture designs are conjured as components that work together to create integrated design systems.
Why Now: All Part & Whole pieces are designed with sustainability in mind and, at the end of their life cycles, products can be broken down to base components and repurposed or recycled — a critical need in today’s world. This year, the furniture maker was awarded a prestigious Monocle Design Award.
Guy Ferguson and Nathan Martell (pictured) are two of Part & Whole’s partners.
Part & Whole’s modular ’70s-style Chord sofa has quilted cushioning and myriad configurations.
Maker: Evan Jerry, Studio Anansi, South Shore, N.S.
In his creation of sculptural and architectural furniture and accessories, Canadian designer and artist Evan Jerry pushes the envelope with his examination of Afro and Black culture and heritages through a contemporary lens.
Why Now: Since founding Studio Anansi in 2018, he has collaborated on designs and collections with CB2, been hailed by the likes of Wallpaper*, Architectural Digest and Interior Design, and exhibited at the London Design Festival. Most recently, he launched new collections with Trnk and Sight Unseen — the latter company’s first furniture collection sold through 1stDibs.
The Lozi vessel (left) and Lozi bowl (above) for Trnk reflect the clean lines that define Studio Anansi designs.
The only adornment on the Brut bar cart for Sight Unseen is a translucent resin handle.
Retailers: Barb Walker and Shara Jawl, The Proper Table, Victoria
These entrepreneurs have a foot in several worlds. At their store in the city’s Estevan area — where they cohabit with fashion brand Leisure — they sell tabletop essentials and decorating accessories to suit design styles from neutral to rainbow- bright. They also run a table settings rental service, through which they coordinate florals, cocktail service and more. (Barb (left) also runs French Kiss Events, and Shara leads Bash Specialty Rentals.) Essentially, they’re a one-stop party resource.
Why Now: With enchanting event design themes like The West Coast, The Romantic and Autumn, the pair has the tools and skills to turn any event into something truly memorable and utterly Instagrammable. (And they’ll clear away all the rentals the next day!)
A simple check brings a wintry table setting to life.
Retailer: Montana Labelle Design & Lifestyle, Toronto
Montana Labelle is part of an innovative new generation of designers who develop omni-channel companies and reach their followings via both physical and digital spaces. A savvy social media presence, the Parsons- trained designer runs a full-service design firm with clients across Canada and the U.S. (her spaces are defined by warm, neutral palettes and groovy vintage finds), as well as online and brick-and-mortar lifestyle stores.
Why Now: She just collaborated on a collection of marble objets with celebrity designer Jeremiah Brent for his new lifestyle store, Atrio, in L.A.
Never one to miss an opportunity, Montana will, of course, also offer the pieces at her own stores in Toronto and online, alongside the other stylish collections that populate the Labelle universe.
Montana Labelle Lifestyle Studio is populated with retro finds as diverse as slouchy leather sofas, stone side tables and 1970s-inspired ceramics.
Retailer: Jochebed Essel, Everyday Joy, Toronto
For Everyday Joy’s owner and founder, Jochebed Essel, attention to even the smallest details is what makes life special, and she shares her appreciation for those things — from svelte stemware to embroidered throw pillows and two-tone storage baskets — through her curated online lifestyle store as well as her multifaceted shop-showroom- studio space in Toronto’s bustling Corktown area.
Why Now: This fall, the female- led, Black-owned business debuted a fresh textile collection — designed in-house and hand-sewn locally — furthering Jochebed’s goal of redefining comfort, style and luxury, and inspiring legions of fans along the way.
Everyday Joy’s Toronto studio is both bright and cozy.
Jochebed fills her shop with joyful, tactile finds like textured throw pillows.
TV Personalities: Caffery Vanhorne and Nicole Babb, Toronto
While the rising stars are new to many Canadians through their HGTV Canada reno and styling show Styled, Caffery Vanhorne (left) and Nicole Babb both have deep roots in design. He’s an award- winning stylist and fashion designer, photographer, furniture designer and now lead stylist at Nicole’s family-owned design firm R&P Home. And she’s a stager, stylist and house flipper known for her ability to maximize any home’s potential.
Why Now: Styled just debuted on HGTV Canada in May. The pair’s spaces are artful and accessible, giving them broad appeal.
On their HGTV Canada show, designers Caffery and Nicole bring classic good looks and unexpected style to the homes they reimagine.
Landscape Designers: Sue Sirrs (right) and Jamie Clarke (left), Outside! Landscape Architects, Halifax
This Nova Scotia firm led by acclaimed landscape architects Sue Sirrs (right) and Jamie Clarke (left) has covered lots of ground since launching in 2006. They created the first permanent exterior living wall in Eastern Canada and designed the first outdoor libraries in the country.
Why Now: In 2022, the firm received awards of excellence from both the CSLA and the APALA. Its most recent residential project is a unique Cabot Trail landscape, where the firm designed and led the installation for an extensive native Acadian forest cover, but also carved out a modern waterfall, sunken garden and trail system to encourage exploration.
At the Cliff House project, lush swathes of native plants are punctuated by lupine blooms.
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