Exploring Life & Business with Sabrina Pflug of Peach and The Willow

Today we’d like to introduce you to Sabrina Pflug.

Hi Sabrina, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
Formerly a professional singer, I have always found the interior design to be my second calling. Now that I am firmly rooted in life’s current chapter, interior design receives first calling status and I couldn’t be happier!

Throughout my adult life (and as time and schedule allowed), I mixed music and interior design projects together. I suppose it all began when I restored and decorated a dilapidated old house built in 1894. I saw its beauty and potential even in spite of its deteriorated appearance.

The renovation and interior design caught the eye of friends (and friends of friends) and suddenly folks were asking if I’d be willing to help them with their home projects. One project led to the next, and suddenly I was a decorator! Sort of “trial by fire” style!

Fast forward to 2016. I have remarried and am a new mom! I had transitioned out of the music business and was seeking a career move that would allow me to put my family first, and job second! I decided to start a lifestyle blog that included subjects like interior design, cooking, and entertaining… all things I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE!

Once again, doors began opening! I started staging homes for real estate agents and picking up small interior design jobs. Small jobs led to bigger jobs like gutting and renovating kitchens and bathrooms, which led to full-scale interior and exterior design including new home construction.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I feel like we all have God-given talents. As a creative, some of my talents include performing and design arts. I have always prayed that I would use my talents for God’s glory and never, ever squander them.

Life has bumps… it can be messy… but at 54 years old I see how I was being molded by every experience, both personally and professionally, to become the person, the designer, I am still becoming to this day!

I feel as though it’s a lifelong quest! And since I was not formally trained in Interior Design, I’ve learned this craft by studying on my own and by simply doing! Have I made design mistakes? Yes. But by practical application, I learned quickly what works and what doesn’t work when it comes to the execution of a design plan.

As far as what makes me a good designer in my opinion??? There are a couple of key factors.

1. I trust my instincts. I have an innate ability to see a finished and complete room from the outset! I trust my gut… then I figure out how to craft the room from a logistics and mechanics standpoint.

2. I really listen to my clients and pay close attention to the environment in which they dwell. I take in things like, “do they collect, are they neat freaks, how many children/pets live in the home, do they live with color or a neutral palette, do they have mismatched furniture, do they like trendy things?”

Learning as much as possible about my client allows me to design for them and them alone. My job is to help them create a home that resonates with their personality, dreams, and lifestyle, and although I always inject some of my own design DNA into every project, the home is not mine… it’s theirs!

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
I am a boutique interior design firm specializing in renovation and new home design in Franklin, Tennesse.

What were you like growing up?
I hail from a small, rural town in the panhandle of Florida with a population of 2,000-ish. I grew up on a big piece of property outside the city limits and shared my earliest days with cows, vegetable rows, and freedom!

No neighbors to speak of… but life was glorious… and fertile ground for a child with imagination and creativity! At around five years old, I began singing publicly. I laugh now that I sang for every funeral, wedding, beauty pageant, church cantata, and hog showing as far back as I can remember!

I attended the University of Florida where I received a voice scholarship and was a Gatorette in the band (still dancing and singing!). During those years, I desperately wanted to go to the Miss America pageant and competed in Miss Florida three times as Miss Northwest Florida, Miss Panama City, and Miss University of Florida.

I was in the Miss Florida Top 10 and received the Most Talented Award in 1989, but alas, the Miss Florida crown was not to be. Still… those experiences readied me for what was to come!

I moved to Nashville out of college and started my professional singing career as a performer aboard the General Jackson Showboat, followed by a stint aboard Seabourne Cruise Line, a 6-month contract that started in Southeast Asia, which crossed to Europe through the Suez Canal and to the Mediterranean.

In 1998, I began singing with Ray Stevens in both a live show and recorded music capacity and still work with the Country Music Hall of Fame Artist to this day. All of these world experiences show up in my work today!

Extensive travel, both domestically and abroad, gave me a greater understanding and up-close window to the different cultures of the world, and these windows no doubt inform every design decision I make today!!!

Contact Info:

• Website: peachandthewillow.com
• Instagram: @Peachandthewillow
• Facebook: Peach and the Willow

Image Credits:
Robyn Rodehaver, Pena Paul, and Nicol Evin Photography