Space ranger
In planning her son Liam’s bedroom, interior designer Liz Potarazu of Potomac-based LP & Co. says she “wanted a room that would grow.” While celebrating the themes he loved as a 6-year-old when the room was completed in 2023, she says she included “some things that would not need to be switched out as he got older.”
At the time she remodeled the 14-by-16-foot room in their Potomac house, “he was into space and dinosaurs.” Design liftoff came when Potarazu found Ruggable’s 8-by-10-foot “Dinosaurs in Space” rug featuring, yes, dinosaurs in space sporting astronaut helmets. She took it from there, creating a room that “feels like a planetarium, and is warm, enveloping and cozy,” she says.
Spacelike navy blue wraps the room, from the Benjamin Moore Polo Blue wall and crown molding paint to the Spoonflower “Night Sky Stars” ceiling wallpaper, which has gold highlights that almost shimmer. The two-tone, room-darkening curtains from Pottery Barn Teen include dark blue, too. A few white accents—on the window, window frame and curtain rods—set off the vast blue.
Flanking the bed are adjustable sconce lights from Wayfair that are shaped “a little like a space station,” Potarazu says. When Liam was younger, she used one as she read to him. Now that he is a strong reader, he likes to read by himself in bed. The white At Home table lamp on the dresser also has a space-age vibe.
Potarazu scouted out space-themed art—“it’s not hard to find,” she says—and floated unframed images on the walls. Some rest on transparent display shelves. All can be swapped out easily.
So can the space theme bedding from Pottery Barn Kids. None of the furniture will need to be replaced. That was part of her plan to design “an elevated kids room, a room that is not too juvenile” or overdone. The finish of the bed and dresser from Pottery Barn Teen is dark espresso, a tone that works as well in the cozy planetarium room as in a teen’s room. They match the Crate & Barrel nightstands.
The camel-tone leather West Elm recliner chair is neutral enough to fit the room now and later. All the furniture is “decent quality,” Potarazu says, so it should last for many years.
Liam’s interests have already changed. At 9, “he’s into baseball cards,” Potarazu says. No problem. In place of the telescope, his card collection is arranged on a nightstand.
Finding their niche
All three of Rob and Jen Rathmell’s kids—preteen girls and a 13-year-old boy—like to chill out in the one-of-a-kind reading nook in their Potomac house. Lisa & Leroy, a full-service design firm in Washington, D.C., remodeled the basement of the 1953 house in 2024, designing a gathering room that opens to the patio. During the planning process, Lisa Shaffer, company CEO and creative director, says the Rathmells often complained about the unneeded and “weird built-ins and closets” in the basement. She removed them. The Rathmells also emphasized that “they wanted a special space for the kids, a place where they could lie down, take a nap, do something besides watch TV,” Shaffer says.
Looking at a particularly odd storage built-in facing the gathering area, Shaffer put two and two together, gutting the storage closet and tucking a nook into the space. “When we opened it up, we found more space behind the built-in. That happens a lot” in older houses, Shaffer says. Here, it allowed Lisa & Leroy to nest an irregular pentagonal nook, about 30 inches front to back and 70 inches long, behind the wall of the main room. It’s snug and cozy, yet big enough for someone to stretch out and read, or even for a couple of tweens to hang out.
The nook entry, a 4-foot-diameter circle about 20 inches off the floor, offers “a fun peekaboo moment,” Shaffer says. It lures everyone inside. Even the cat.
“We built up the nook floor to 15 inches to accommodate a 3-inch-thick cushion” at entry level, says Meggie Ladonis, a senior designer at Lisa & Leroy. Inna Sew Versatile of Leesburg, Virginia, crafted the custom cushion and a wedge-shaped back cushion, upholstering them with Granada Truffle by Fabricut. Inna Sew Versatile covered a pillow with a floral velvet from Fabricut. The green pillow is from Ryan Studio.
The sophisticated fabrics and wall colors were a conscious choice. “We stay away from primary colors” and bright shades in kids spaces, says Shaffer, because they look “too juvenile.” The Rathmell kids like orange. Lisa & Leroy painted the nook in Sherwin-Williams 7583 Wild Currant, which is “a moody” burnt orange, says Shaffer, that “will grow with them as they grow older.” The color also offsets the Grasscloth from York Wallcoverings outside the space.
Wall cubes inside the nook are great for books, decor and water bottles. The nook “is a great spot to have a high-low budget,” Ladonis says. “Splurge on the statement fabrics and save on basic cubes.” These are Ikea cubes, Eket style, in light gray-blue.
With an adjustable wall sconce and a wall outlet to power devices, the nook has everything for kids, whether they want to squeeze in together or use it alone as “I need a minute” getaway space, Shaffer says.
Home sweet playhouse
Juliette Poussot and Duko Hopman moved with their two young children from Miami to a new house in Chevy Chase in August, just before the school year started. As an icebreaker, their 5-year-old daughter’s new school asked each child, “What’s one thing we should know about you?” For her, the answer was easy: “There’s a playhouse inside my house!”
Poussot was delighted. A design director at the architectural firm Gensler, she created the built-in playhouse as “something for my kids to get excited about” after moving to a new house. Garrett Park builder Patrick Keating and his daughter Bretton Mork partnered with Bethesda-based GTM Architects to design and construct the contemporary shingle-style spec house, incorporating a large basement as a recreation area. Coming from Florida, where most houses lack basements, Poussot says she wanted to tap into the “basement culture.” She set up one end of the 18½-by-42-foot room as a lounge, and the other as “an inviting place the kids would want to be in.” Setting up a basement kids zone was a way, she adds, of “keeping the rest of the house pristine.”
A recess about 2½ feet deep spans much of the end wall and was an ideal place for a built-in. Poussot designed an elegant ensemble with shelving and storage cabinets on two sides and a playhouse in the middle. Features such as angled top pieces keep the shelving from looking “too stiff or library-esque,” she says. Nodding to the style of the house itself, the playhouse has the same roof pitch. White oak veneer panels on the playhouse rooftop, pediment and walls, and the luxury plank basement flooring by Mott, pick up the tones of the oak flooring elsewhere in the house.
Abernethy Sticks of Kensington fabricated the built-ins, delivering them in sections that fit down the stairs and reassembling them on-site. The company programmed a router to cut grooves in the playhouse’s roofing panels to simulate shingles. Abernethy stained some components and painted others using Benjamin Moore blue-gray Amsterdam paint, which Poussot chose for its warm contemporary aesthetic. She accented it with bright yellow light fixtures and fabrics for a combination that “pops.”
Inside the playhouse is a cushioned bench with cubbies below. Poussot upholstered the cushion herself with commercial-grade Kvadrat Ria fabric. BulbSquare yellow sconces light each end of the playhouse’s interior. Poussot had a little puppet theater growing up, so a puppet show window with a ledge and a citron-colored curtain made from Designtex’s Curtain Call drapery occupies center stage on the playhouse.
Poussot and Hopman’s 2½-year-old son loves that opening. These days he plays barista or storekeeper. The kids often use the playhouse as a clubhouse, a cozy spot and a place to bring friends.
But this is “our forever home,” Poussot says, “and I want it to stand the test of time.” Solution: The playhouse is removable. “It’s screwed onto the face frame and can be popped off” when the family outgrows it, says Joe Abernethy, owner of Abernethy Sticks. Distinctive trim tracing the roof shape is a permanent element, but details such as the bench fabric can be updated easily. The whole built-in wall structure, Poussot says, “will remain a beautiful bookshelf and seating area.”
This appears in the January/February 2026 issue of Bethesda Magazine.
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