Layered for Living: Ariel Okin ’09 on Design, Storytelling and Style

On any given day, Ariel Okin ’09 might be moving between a Park Avenue apartment, a Connecticut country house, and a creative brainstorm meeting for her latest media venture. But the common thread behind each day is always the same: storytelling through design. As the founder of Ariel Okin Interiors (AOI), she has built a nationally recognized company on a deceptively simple idea: a home should feel like its owner.

 

Warm, livable, and elegant, her rooms balance history and modernity. She calls her style “traditional with a twist,” which honors the architecture and craftsmanship, while refusing to take it all too seriously. “It's a traditional sofa in a surprising fabric, or an antique paired with something thoroughly modern,” she explains. “It's a room that feel rooted and considered, but never stuffy or precious.”

 

But Ariel’s path to design wasn’t linear. It was layered — much like the interiors she creates.

 

At Baldwin, Ariel found something that would shape every chapter of her career: a sense of possibility. “When every leadership role is held by a girl, it quietly rewires your expectations,” she reflects. That environment didn’t just build confidence, it normalized ambition.

 

Encouraged to pursue her interests, whether in art, writing, or debate, Ariel learned to treat curiosity as a strength. Teachers like Janice Wilke and Margo Cairns helped sharpen both her visual sensibility and her voice, nurturing a dual passion for storytelling and aesthetics that would later define her career.

 

Ariel went on to study journalism at The George Washington University and earned a master’s degree from Columbia University, initially envisioning a future in political journalism. Design entered her life more quietly, through her own apartment. Friends “loved what she did with the place,” and began asking for help with their own spaces. Side projects multiplied, and what started as a creative outlet soon became something more substantial. After three years of building a client base alongside her full-time job, Ariel made the leap. In 2016, she launched AOI.

 

The early days were equal parts exhilarating and humbling. “I was doing everything myself,” she says. “I was doing client presentations, sourcing, and figuring out the business side of things in real time. There was no roadmap, which was terrifying and, in retrospect, incredibly freeing. I learned so much in those early years about what kind of firm I wanted to build, about client relationships, and the importance of super clear communication and organization.” 

 

While Ariel’s signature style is rooted in respect for architecture and history, it’s never constrained by it. “It’s about tension,” she explains. “That’s where the personality of a room lives.” Her work is marked by clean lines, thoughtful color, and a mix of bespoke and vintage pieces. But no two projects look alike. Each home is treated as a narrative that unfolds through careful listening, observation, and layering.

 

Recognition came steadily. Her work has appeared in leading publications like Architectural Digest, Elle Decor, Vogue, The Wall Street Journal, and New York Magazine. In 2022, she was named to House Beautiful’s prestigious Next Wave list.

 

Certain projects mark milestones for Ariel. “There have been a few moments that felt like real inflection points, namely when the apartment we designed for Lena Dunham was on the cover of Domino,” she explains. “The first time we had a project published in a major shelter magazine, especially it being the cover, was genuinely formative and really moved the needle in terms of our industry exposure and visibility. Seeing the work captured and shared on that kind of platform made everything feel more real and was validation that what we were building was resonating beyond our immediate circle.”

 

But Ariel is quick to note that quieter moments matter too. “A client who referred multiple friends, or a project where everything just clicked and I thought, this is exactly the kind of work I want to be doing,” she says. “Those moments matter just as much!”

 

Ariel’s background in journalism also expanded over the years. In 2020, she started Fenimore Lane, named after the Gladwyne street she grew up on, when the pandemic put a freeze on outside writers. “I have contributed as a writer to Vogue for the last decade, and I used to write for Architectural Digest and Domino as well. But during the pandemic, I still wanted to write. I had been percolating on starting a media business with digital editorial for a while, and that really gave me the push to begin.”

 

Fenimore Lane Media has evolved into not just digital editorial, but also includes Talk Shop, a top design podcast, and the Fenimore Lane Design Summit, an annual signature in-person event at The Mayflower Inn & Spa, which gathers more than 500 likeminded interior design creatives in partnership with Auberge Collection. It also includes e-commerce and licensed collections with brands like Pomegranate and Hudson Valley Lighting’s Mitzi.

 

“The media side and the design side feed each other in ways I don't think I fully anticipated when I was building them,” Ariel reflects. “The writing keeps me analytical and curious. It pushes me to understand why certain interiors work and to articulate that clearly, which in turn makes me a better designer and a better communicator with clients. Each platform reaches a different person at a different moment, but they're all rooted in the same underlying belief: that a beautiful, personal home makes for a better, happier life.”

 

That philosophy comes to life in her bestselling book, The Happy Home: Layered Interiors for Joyful Living, published by Rizzoli. More than a visual portfolio, it offers a framework for creating spaces that feel meaningful and lived-in.

 

For Ariel, “joyful living” isn’t about trend or perfection. It’s about resonance. “It's about a home that works for your actual life, that holds your history, that makes you feel like yourself the moment you walk in the door,” she says. “Joy in a home is in the details that are yours — the art you saved up for or stumbled upon in a junk shop, the chair that belonged to your grandmother, the color that makes you inexplicably happy every time you see it.”

 

Looking back, Ariel would tell her younger self one thing: trust the winding path. Her unconventional route, from journalism to design to media, became her greatest asset.

 

To current students, her advice is equally clear: follow what genuinely excites you. “Take your interests seriously, even the ones that don't have an obvious career attached to them yet,” she says. “What do you enjoy doing the most that doesn’t feel like work? What do you find relaxing or energizing? What makes you the happiest? Follow that. The skills you build while pursuing what genuinely excites you will transfer everywhere. And don't wait until you feel fully ready to start something. You'll learn more in the doing than you ever will in the preparation!”