Eve Al-Rashid

Eve grew up in Smithtown, New York surrounded by Long Island’s Gold Coast country houses that would spark her fascination with architecture. As a child, she devoured her mother's books about these opulent estates, dreaming about Beaux Arts details and imagining how they came to life during Carnegie and Rockefeller's era. Some of these estates were being torn down, but others like Oheka Castle and Old Westbury Gardens were preserved — and Eve got to tour them for her master's thesis on the Woolworth family estate, Winfield Hall.

Eve’s interior design path began as an art history major at Bowdoin College, near where she spent magical childhood summers. Bowdoin’s idyllic campus captivated her, though Maine winters took some getting used to. Eve grew up as a competitive classical musician, performing solo piano performances at Steinway Hall, and on double bass at Carnegie Hall and Alice Tulley Hall with New York Youth Symphony. But by college, she needed a break from music to explore her other passion: understanding how spaces and art tell stories.

A study abroad program in Florence sealed the deal. Seeing Caravaggio's dramatic chiaroscuro paintings in person, with their interplay of light and dark, Eve knew she wanted to work with spaces and light. After a few years in Boston (where she fell in love with the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum), Eve headed to Chicago for her Master of Arts in Interior Design. The Windy City became her favorite; she lived near the Art Institute of Chicago, caught Cubs games, and soaked up all the architecture.

Eve's career has taken her from coast to coast. She started with Kristine Irving at Koo de Kir, a high-end residential designer in Boston’s historic Beacon Hill, then moved to Los Angeles for five years with Bilden Corp., working on high-end residential projects. More recently, she was Senior Designer in Advertising at Ethan Allen, creating room designs for everything from magazine shoots to commercials.

Eve settled in Westbrook, Connecticut with her husband Nawaf (who works in tech and loves the Connecticut shoreline), their daughter Loulou (who takes violin lessons and doesn't appreciate when mom plays Beethoven – "too loud!"), and Penny, their Belgian Malinois.

Eve still plays piano — Chopin is her favorite — and loves to travel. She and Nawaf have been everywhere from Fiji to the Middle East, where she got to float effortlessly in the Dead Sea. She's also a devoted reader of Jane Austen and loves getting lost in classic literature.