DOING LONG DISTANCE

With her clients on the opposite coast, designer Ashley Lavonne Walker steers a masterful renovation of a landmark house in Los Angeles.

- Camille Okhio

When Ashley Lavonne Walker started her own interior design firm in 2021 in Los Angeles, she quickly hooked a dream project: the top-tobottom redo of a historic home in the city's Hancock Park neighborhood. After almost a decade working for some of the city's top designers-including ELLE DECOR A-List talents Martyn Lawrence Bullard, Michael S. Smith, and Reath Design the Ohio native was more than ready for the challenge. But there was a catch. Her clients, Kaeli Deane and Chris Beals, were living across the country throughout the renovation. "We had to do almost everything over email and Zoom," Lavonne Walker says.