Thomas O’Brien is an interior and home furnishings designer based in New York City. He is the founder and President of Aero Studios, one of America’s leading design firms. O’Brien has been celebrated for translating modernism into a warm and livable style. From private residences to commercial properties, product design to brand and fine art consulting, his work is known for its collected, vintage elegance, even as it is sympathetic to the most practical ideas of home. His sense of the modern comes from filtering together elements from different historical origins, in combinations that can seem at once familiar and revealing: the shared simplicity between 20th century and classical forms; the balance of rustic and refined, comfort and rarity.
Thomas O'Brien, Century Furniture Designer
Thomas, you are a legend in both residential and commercial interior design and home furnishings and accessory product design with your stunning collections with Century Furniture, along with lighting, tableware, textiles and rugs. Your design and retail firms in NY, Aero Studios, and Aero Ltd., are extraordinary examples of the realization of a modern aesthetic and lifestyle. Can you give our readers some insight on how you view modern interiors and the lifestyle of today’s luxury consumer?
For our clients we are always looking for what is beautiful and well made. This is about the millwork and construction as much as the furnishings. We balance what feels modern and fresh with refined details and well-crafted things. Simple things too, like easy, but beautiful materials and fabrics combined with very special and richer textiles. I like modern and classic things to be combined. It’s getting that balance of what is refined with what is simple.
When you approach a whole-home residential interior design project, is there a particular area you like to begin with, and why?
We do always look to fabrics and materials like wood and marble to start the thinking about what the character of a place will be. The floors are a very good place to start.. I think it is so good to pull together many things you love and wish you could use and then it’s about sorting out how they work together or also what becomes the most singular.
We know you are based in New York City, and there is plenty of fashion inspiration there for sure, but is there anywhere else that you absolutely love to gain inspiration from?
Inspirations can come from so many places and also just small details. I find inspiration in movies, books and things I collect of many kinds. We also look back to our work and reinvent things time and again. It is important to bring forward things you have liked before or always wanted to do and find new ways to invent fresh interiors. What we remember we liked is always the best inspiration.
Our Inspiring magazine takes a keen interest in textiles and the art of upholstered furnishings. Can you give us some of your thoughts on the trends that you see in color and texture in your own projects, both for interior design and your own product development?
We have been looking lately at a lot of wonderful textured wool fabrics in natural colorations. Very vintage feeling, but modern too. At the same time some of the most luxe things like Fortuny Fabrics and hand painted wall papers are so appealing to clients. Always a very few special textiles are important and are often what provides the color or richness.
The retail marketplace has certainly adjusted from the highs of the unprecedented COVID-era demand level, yet the luxury consumer has been far more resilient than those further down the price-point scale. Can you share some insight on the types of design projects that you spend most of your time on recently?
I am always working on product design and my two stores Aero and Copper Beech. I love having the stores and finding things new and old for them is always connected to projects we have going on. We have been working the last few years on all of the architectural aspects of several projects and now have really begun all of the interiors all at once. We are working on second homes in Charleston, Miami and upstate New York. Miami is the most modern and also very collected. The other homes are quite classic and we are working on finding the way that they are modern in feel with wonderful classic details
“Collect and live with things that you are truly interested in.” Thomas O’Brien
What would be one tip that you could give to our readers when it comes to accessorizing a room?
I always think real and personal things make the best rooms. That could also all be new but about something you are learning about and really love. Collect and live with things that you are truly interested in.