Taking It Slow

Years in the making, a New York City town house becomes designer Sara Story's forever home

- By David Foxley

Sara Story is not one to shy away from daunting obstacles. "That's what makes life more interesting," the interior designer says, perched in her bright Manhattan living room. "It's hiking Mount Kilimanjaro, running a marathon-figuring out something to challenge yourself physically and mentally."

For anyone familiar with Story, who is regarded perhaps as much for her adventurous spirit as her bold oeuvre, that sentiment is no surprise. Case in point: realizing her vision for the five-story Gramercy Park brownstone in which she and her husband individually assembled nine out of 10 apartments, with minimal architectural assistance, over almost two decades. (One tenant, in a small garden flat, is the remaining holdout.) "It's basically like a Wes Anderson hotel," the mother of three says with a booming laugh. "It's just layers upon layers upon layers."

Although her design process is usually studied and methodical, Story says she intentionally let this project evolve over time. "It's more like, Oh, I have a couple of tables that I bought in Turkey. Yeah, I'm just going to put them there. Or, I'm in London and I see this vintage chair-I really love it-I'm just going to get it. And then I put it all together." Even so, traces of a mastermind at work are evident on every level.