An Interview With Candice Georgiadis
Celebrate Story — To me, joy within your home begins with story and celebrating with enthusiasm what makes your own unique. Within my own home, that means featuring objects and experiences that have grown me. Travelling to remote places with my camera and featuring those photographs in my home, bringing home unique and treasured pieces to remind me of those travels and placing them in spaces that can spark unique conversation with guests such as dining rooms, powder rooms, or the entry.
As part of my series on the “5 Things You Can Do To Help Your Living Space Spark More Joy’’, I had the pleasure of interviewing Paige Gray, Partner and Lead Interior Designer of Parker&Harlow Interiors.
Parker&Harlow — Parker&Harlow Interiors is a boutique interior design firm on British Columbia’s West Coast. Powered by the dynamic mother-daughter duo, Deb Vanderkemp and Paige Gray, their team provides an intuitive reflection of your lifestyle and vision. With a passion for transforming the holistic qualities of the coast into refined spaces that live beautifully and inspire ease, Parker & Harlow has been working in the design industry all along the coast of British Columbia for 28 years.
Thank you so much for joining us in this series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
I would say my love for design started at the threshold between adventure and creativity. I’ve always loved stories, in evocative objects, meaningful spaces, and intentional daily practices especially when integrated into our coastal culture. To this day, when I’m not in a creative headspace, I’m finding inspiration in the wilderness hiking in our endless backcountry, chasing waterfalls, and climbing peaks. Our breathtaking landscape here on the west coast of British Columbia is an endless source of inspiration for me.
I began designing furniture and exploring various creative mediums from a young age, which inevitably lured me to attend Emily Carr University for industrial design. At the time, the campus was in the heart of Vancouver on Granville Island, and those years were truly some of the most valuable contributors to my creative practice today. Pressing through personal thresholds, celebrating new discoveries in both success and failure, and finding the pulse on my own design processes gave me insight into the methods I now carry forward into business. I am so grateful to have worked alongside some of the most incredible leading professionals in BC. Over time my love for the coast and deep appreciation for family brought me back to my roots to partner with my incredible mother who’s entrepreneurial expertise added the perfect touch to our longtime dream of launching a design company together. This is where Parker&Harlow was born!
Can you share the most interesting story that happened to you since you started this career?
My commute to work has to be the most interesting part of my job. Boats, barges, and ferries are a regular day-to-day occurrence for me. It is something I love about the specialty process of designing on remote islands. Unless of course it’s in a February winter storm, on a very small ferry boat headed to a secluded coastal island where the ocean is lapping through the boat deck- but still a very interesting adventure!
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
Heels on the job site just isn’t the most practical situation when you work on islands in the heart of a west coast rainforest and your project is in the thick of landscaping, masonry, and a water irrigation upgrade! Luckily, the precarious situation was resolved quickly with a pair of Blundstones I keep in my vehicle for hiking. A practical and very “west-coast” solution.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? How do you think that might help people?
Many of our clients hire us because we specialize in full-scale renovations on remote islands up the coast. One of our current projects is located on Cortes Island, BC and the residence serves as a second home for our clients who lived primarily in Vancouver before purchasing their coastal retreat during the start of the pandemic. During these precarious times, lifestyles are shifting and with these changes many of our clients and trades are looking to embrace new avenues of escaping to, and harnessing, the immeasurable gifts of our secluded coast. This helps our clients find balance, and helps us to employ an extensive trade resource on projects that are unlike any other. Many of our trades have been living on Cortes Island over the past year as this comprehensive project has come through an intense upgrade. The results are a beautiful reflection of what it looks like when passion meets the design process on many levels. It has been a magical process, and we have lapped up every moment of our time working on this gorgeous island with our amazing team.
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
“Do or do not, there is no try”. -Yoda
Although many Maya Angelou quotes come to mind, the intense commitment that comes to play with the specific work we take on requires a more direct inspiration. This quote is still on a sticky note on my bathroom mirror, and I soak it in every morning. Although there is merit in trying, it is a mindset driven by the fear of failure. In my own life, personally and professionally, when I was able to cut my own internally constructed excuses and exercise a “do” mentality, it took the fear out of leaping into unknowns. Let go of the fear of failing and trust that your innate human grit has the potential to propel your life into meaningful spaces where fear becomes your fuel not your roadblock.
None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?
Many people within the industry that I’ve gained the most experience from are also those who have oddly caused me the greatest heartache. There is a standard in interior design that needs immense overhaul — that junior designers are an expendable resource.
Unpaid internships for big names in the industry were something I felt niched into accepting, and although it came with valuable life lessons, I knew right away that this type of leadership wasn’t a practice I was willing to bring forward into my own business.
Both of my parents have been business owners their entire lives. Leading with a “people-first” mindset has provided them the opportunity of guiding the same employees for over thirty years. There is tremendous value and honour in this type of leadership, and I’m so grateful to have been raised with such tremendous examples of how to respect and honour employees while fostering a nurturing environment for them to succeed.
It is the main contributor to partnering with my mother, who’s grace, patience, and attention to detail has become a cornerstone in the way we celebrate our team at Parker&Harlow. I have gratitude for both sides of my experience in this industry, to the companies who gave me the gift of feeling undervalued and the incredible woman who stands beside me now in business to ensure no employee in our own team ever feels that way.
Thank you for that. Here is the main question of our discussion. What are your “5 Things You Can Do To Help Your Living Space Spark More Joy” and why. Please share a story or example for each.
Celebrate Story
To me, joy within your home begins with story and celebrating with enthusiasm what makes your own unique. Within my own home, that means featuring objects and experiences that have grown me. Travelling to remote places with my camera and featuring those photographs in my home, bringing home unique and treasured pieces to remind me of those travels and placing them in spaces that can spark unique conversation with guests such as dining rooms, powder rooms, or the entry.
Organize and Edit
Taking on a minimal lifestyle is difficult for everyone, but paring down your functional spaces so that you spend less time moving things you don’t need to get to the things you do, makes cleanup so much faster and gives you more time to enjoy the space rather than working on it. Also upgrading mismatched items like mugs, cups and cutlery has oddly given me immense joy when setting the table and gathering with friends and family.
Our furry friends
There is a dynamic humour and joy that radiates from our dogs in my own household and I’m sure any pet owner can agree that they just make life better. They give balance to the otherwise overwhelming perfection of a “still” home. They’re the movers and shakers, keeping life on its toes. They also drive us to go outside our home, exploring our coast, which keeps life inside our home more holistic and centered. For Deb and I in business, they’re also the inspiration behind our name!
Make a Mess
Spaces are made to be used, and this means bringing people in to celebrate it with you. Whether it’s kids’ science experiments on the dining room table or dirt and mud from messy paws that have galloped through gardens leaving trails across the floor for you to find, find joy in the moments that would usually cause you to feel anxiety or stress. The dirty paw prints belong to those creatures you can’t live without. The erupting volcano on your table is a precious pillar to childhood exploration, and the aftermath of that dinner party is also the moment your home feels most relaxed and appreciated by those you love.
Never Stop Evolving
Spaces should be a reflection of ourselves, and with that, they are ever-changing, complex, sporadic depictions of where our lives are at any given moment. Play around with your layout. Growing up, Deb (My Mum) and I would often spend the evening rearranging furniture while my Dad was out of the house. He would come home to a whole new design and smile at the faces of the two ladies in his life feeling very accomplished for their efforts. Who would have known back then that those very women would be running their design company together with equal enthusiasm and joy!
You are a person of great influence. If you could start a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
I would have to return to the time in my own life that influenced me to reach beyond my own capabilities and direct this question/conversation to the field of education. University is an incredible space for young adults to grow and find the unique ways they fit into and influence the world. Finding ways to bring enthusiasm and funding initiatives that aim to send more kids on the path to higher education would be amazing. Quite often the task of applications and the pressure to know exactly where to go outweighs the act of simply going out and doing! My own path began with fine arts, shifted to architecture, and circled back into interior design. Minds can change, career paths shift and accommodate, and if there was a way to spark passion and support more kids to take that leap on to university level learning — I’m all for it! Especially in the fields of creative arts, design, and more philanthropic-centered education paths.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why? He or she might see this, especially if we tag them 🙂
The roots of this particular family-run multi-faceted company have inspired me since the beginning. With the many initiatives and brands they have come to lead as well as the cadence, spirit, and vigor clearly expressed in each member of their team, I have to say Joanna and Chip Gaines. Now, I’m aware that’s two people, but some of the best things come in pairs especially with family-run business. Their quirky authenticity together, as well as the baseline they hold for family and personal space, is something I truly admire.
Thank you so much for joining us. This was very inspirational!
Paige Gray of Parker & Harlow: 5 Things You Can Do To Help Your Living Space Spark More Joy was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.