secrets and lives —
AND THE 7 SINS with STEPHANIE SMITH
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espite being exposed to the art and design world from her youngest years, Stephanie Smith never really thought she’d end up there for her career. “My mom is an artist and is in design, and she also did art studies at Emily Carr,” Stephanie says. “She had a gallery when I was a young teen, so I learned how to cut glass and frames, and do all the assembly from about 12 years old.” After finishing a degree in business and marketing, Stephanie agreed to let her mom train her at Ethan Allen furniture—“I really thought it was going to be a shortterm venture”—and she has been in the design and furniture industry ever since. Now the president of Oriental Casa’s flagship North American store on South Granville, Stephanie has come back to loving furniture after taking a few years away. “I saw people shopping for mostly throwaway pieces, things that would just end up in a landfill in a few years. I’d been in interior design for so long, and I had been losing the passion,” she says. “So I left furniture for a few years, but this line really brought me back. It’s so unusual, and just the details in each piece...you could easily mix in a piece and create real interest in your room, or do a whole room and create a dramatic, beautiful look.” Besides being beautifully designed with intricate detail work, it was the quality of the pieces that sold Stephanie.
WORDS ANGELA COWAN 90
B O U L E VA R D
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PHOTOGRAPHY LIA CROWE
