Community Highlights: Meet Stephanie Sabbe of Sabbe Interior Design

Today we’d like to introduce you to Stephanie Sabbe.

Stephanie, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I was told by a fortune teller (a teacher dressed as a fortune teller) that I would be an interior designer when I was in the second grade and it has been my story ever since. I graduated from the University of Tennessee’s School of Architecture and Design in 2004 and after 7 years of working for commercial architecture firms in Nashville, Memphis, and Boston I started Sabbe Interior Design.

For years, it was just me working in the corner of our tiny bedroom in Boston’s Fenway neighborhood and we gradually grew over the years. It has never been a story of overnight success for me. I have been doing this now for 20 years, and have been published in over a dozen shelter mags but our growth over time continues to be slow and steady.

As a wife and mother of four, I am thankful for the pace we have established. In the past two years, we have become so much better at identifying our ideal client type and have been able to spend time honing our craft instead of simply producing volume. I love what I do and am thankful every day that I listened to the second-grade teacher/fortune teller.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Smooth-ish. There has never been a moment, although I threaten sometimes, where I truly want to quit. I worked in some really hard environments during my first few years out of school. Sleepless nights, crazy deadlines, really harsh bosses trying to over-perform for the harsh bosses above them. So I have the perspective to know that a client’s angry late-night email or a workroom underperforming is yes stressful, but not the end of the world.

I own the company and can turn the ship at any time and there is so much sanity in that. If anyone is truly terrible to work with, we just don’t have to work with them anymore. It’s that simple. Some so many people do what we do and forcing a relationship is just never a good idea. My husband is a physician and that helps me maintain so much perspective. I remember during one particularly stressful season in our office he was managing end-of-life pain care for a teenage boy with cancer whose mother was living in such poverty that she could not afford to stay anywhere other than in his hospital room.

I think my stress was regarding a sofa not fitting in a library niche. And no matter how mad anyone got at me for the mistake all I could think of was my husband talking every day with that mama sitting next to her dying son. I tell clients all the time “This is fixable” because everything is. But what I often want to say and don’t is “Respectfully, this doesn’t matter” I do love my job and it is such a gift to be able to do what I do, but at the end of the day it doesn’t matter.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
We are a bespoke design firm specializing in collecting, “new-old” interiors. We have worked in both the residential and commercial sectors and have a passion for creating spaces that look like they have always been there.

Our work has been featured in House Beautiful, Traditional Home, Southern Living, The Wall Street Journal, and more. In 2022, we opened a retail shop that was recently named one of Veranda Magazines’ “Most Beautiful Shops in the World”.

Any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general?
Social media has been a great resource for me. Never be afraid to drop a DM. In the past, I joined our local ASID and LEED chapters and networked that way.

But I think just messaging people and explaining your interest/admiration etc. is the way to go these days. The worst thing that can happen is they never reply, but never take that personally. People are busy.

Contact Info:

• Website: sabbeinteriordesign.com
• Instagram: @sabbeinteriordesign

Image Credits
Paige Rumore and Cameron Jones