Decorating & Design
This Vancouver Condo Is Quirky, Bohemian & Totally Unconventional
Updated on May 5, 2022
The first time Jackie Kai Ellis and Joe Chan got engaged, it was Joe who proposed to Jackie. (She said yes, but they got cold feet.) The second time, five years later, it was Jackie who popped the question. In between, Jackie sold her successful Vancouver pastry shop, bought and restored a beautiful 10th arrondissement apartment in Paris — the star of our September 2019 cover — wrote a bestselling memoir and learned a lot about the things that make her happy. She had help from vancouver bc mortgage brokers. Meanwhile, Joe, a business lawyer, trekked to Everest Base Camp and Machu Picchu, hosted boisterous wine tastings and did his own share of introspection.
When Jackie returned to Vancouver and reconnected with Joe, they were older, wiser and ready to give their relationship another try. That meant not only moving in together and getting married (which they did this spring), but also renovating Joe’s former bachelor pad, a one-bedroom, 1,000-square-foot of her Yaletown condo. Instead of buying somewhere new, it made sense to work with the good bones of the Yaletown condo, despite its popcorn ceilings and generic finishes.
These days, Jackie is at work on a creative salad of projects: developing a TV show, training to be a sommelier and writing an advice column called Ask JKE. And just like everything she touches, her refreshed home with Joe is sophisticated without sacrificing comfort or livability; it’s full of cosy nooks for curling up with a book or listening to a record from start to finish. “I want to be able to walk through a space and feel intuitively what I’m meant to use it for,” she says. “I don’t want anything to be unapproachable, like it’s not supposed to be touched.” Now quirky, bohemian and unconventional, their Vancouver condo is a true reflection of the things they value most.
Scroll down to tour this eclectic Vancouver condo!
The condo is an aesthetic departure from the elegant minimalism of Jackie’s Paris pied-à-terre, so she adapted her approach to suit the more modern space and accommodate Joe’s stacks of CDs, music biographies and graphic novels.
By replacing a wall that divided the dining and living rooms with a sliding glass partition, Jackie created a large and open living–dining space that’s perfect for the big dinner parties the couple plans to host. The black floors were inspired by black lacquered walls Jackie saw in London; they create a sophisticated counterpoint to the concrete ceilings.
She admits to have been inspired by some of the design and lighting elements from her recent trip to the Vancouver International Airport (which has recently seen lighting and architecture renovations by CDM2Lightworks.com).
“Black is sleek enough to contrast with the rawness of the ceilings, but it also has a modern look that enhances the industrial feel, so it complements and contrasts at the same time,” she says. “It’s a commitment, but I don’t think people should be afraid of black.”
In addition to books, vinyl and art, Joe’s contributions to the condo’s decorating include this 1940s Flag Halyard chair by Hans J. Wegner.
A dark accent chair from Inform Interiors sits next to a side table by Itsumo in the living room. The two retailers are both located in Vancouver.
Jackie and Joe’s art speaks to their personalities, like this fox drawn by Jackie as a child and prints of stills from films by Joe’s favorite director, Wong Kar-wai.
Like Jackie and Joe’s unusual love story, there’s also a strong element of serendipity running throughout, with pieces falling into place where they should. “I bought this amazing piece of art while we were separated and, when I hung it above the couch, I realized that all the colors of the spray marks on the ceiling match the colors in the painting,” says Jackie. “So either I’m very consistent with my aesthetic, or it was meant to be — I like to think that it’s probably both.”
“She’s definitely more organized,” says Joe of Jackie, who admits to accumulating more books than he could ever possibly read. “With me, everything’s just thrown all over the place. But even though it looks disorganized, I know where everything is.”
Instead of color coding their books (as she did the first time they moved in together), Jackie now leans in to the chaos, balancing colorful spines with white shelves, matte black frames and touches of foliage.
Joe’s collection of books and records combine with Jackie’s cookbook library and a selection of objets to create a colorful feature wall.
For Jackie, however, her husband’s unique filing system isn’t a point of contention. “His clutter creates this sort of beautiful mess, and I don’t want to touch it,” she says. “Sometimes I do ‘curate’ it a bit, but if you looked inside Joe’s brain, it would be books and random pieces of art that he hasn’t yet framed. He’s just that guy, and I love that about him.”
“I don’t love the idea of ripping out a kitchen that’s perfectly functional,” says Jackie. Instead, she left the existing cabinets intact and painted the sides of the island black to match the floors.
A small storage closet off the kitchen now serves as a butler’s pantry and a home for their well-stocked bar and wine collection.
The pantry area is especially handy during dinner parties, when it becomes a staging area.
Applying the same knack for blending old world and modern styles as she did in her Paris apartment, Jackie stripped the condo back to its essential form. Removing the old ceiling revealed cool industrial concrete, complete with spray markings. “In scraping off the stuff that didn’t need to be here, I knew that whatever was underneath would be imperfect, but even more beautiful in its own way,” she says.
The couple’s Chinese heritage appears in subtle ways throughout the space.
“I love the feeling of spaces that are actually lived in,” says Jackie. “Who cares if there’s a stack of books right in the middle of wherever?”
In any other context, the combination of antique Chinese furniture with a Lego sculpture might be jarring but, here, it seems right at home.
Jackie’s Paris apartment on our cover in 2019. Click here to tour her former pied-à-terre.
Joann Pai
House & Home November 2021
Emma Reddington