Being on Oprah? You realize that there are a couple of types of audience members. There are like the cult people in the audience who are just crying before she gets on. And then there are the people who are playing it cool. I definitely was somewhere in the middle.
I'm opening a store at the end of the month in the New York meatpacking district. I'm launching a line of bedding this summer, and I am writing a book that will be out next January.
But instead of that stuff you get relationships with people and neighbors that you would never get in a city. People in small towns are a lot more open.
I will not do work that isn't done well or right. Stuff happens - things break, contractors don't come through - but I don't want to be responsible for not doing something correctly.
I think taking design out of the studio and really having a relationship with the people that you're making it for really convinced me of how powerful a thing design is. It's not just an aesthetic decoration.
The Deep South has a completely different history, both good and bad, that is fascinating for everybody. It makes people work together who usually don't, and that sounds like a cliche in so many ways, but it actually happened... and it happened because of a beautiful idea.
So, to really execute design in its highest form and making people feel joy, that's a great reward.
It's not about doing over the living room of someone who has bad taste in color. This is about restoring historic buildings and instilling pride in a community, which can be done through designing new public spaces and social gathering spots.
Design can have such a positive impact on the way people live and on their relationships and moods.
It's about the power of design and the power of the human spirit. It's above paying anybody to do something stupid for money like reality television does - like ambushing people.
And the relationships that happen become so intense, deep, involved and complex and really hard to say goodbye to. The hardest part of the show is saying goodbye when it's all done. It really breaks you.
I'm so used to talk-show hosts just giving you a sound bite and not really being interested.
