Big Easy Elegance

At home in New Orleans, interior designer Michelle R. Smith's decorating secret weapon is restraint.

- CAMILLE OKHIO

Built in 1865, the Greek Revival house in New Orleans that interior designer Michelle R. Smith calls home is a beacon of ease and refinement. Designed by the society architect Myrlin McCullar, the home's well-preserved period rooms were a draw for Smith when she decided to relocate from New York City with her young family. And when it comes to impressive architecture, she's in good company. "All the houses on this street are different,"

Smith observes of her neighbors in the city's Garden District. "Every time I take a walk, I notice a new detail." Smith grew up in Berwick, Louisiana, where her parents still live, about an hour and a half outside New Orleans. She moved to New York City 15 years ago for law school, then, after a year as a practicing litigator, pursued a graduate degree in tax law. "It was really just an excuse to come to New York," she says of that period in her life. "I worked long enough at a law firm to understand what that future looked like, and I couldn't see it for me."

So Smith went in an entirely new direction. Determined to pursue her growing interest in interiors, she interned with Daniel Romualdez, learning everything she could before starting her own design firm, Studio MRS, in Brooklyn in 2013. Since then, she has built a reputation for timeless interiors that are as livable as they are interesting. "Her work is comfortable and approachable, but in nearly every space there is something curious, something remarkable," says Shane Robuck, the Atlanta antiques dealer who is one of Smith's go-tos.