The Kind of Online After-Moving Sale Only an Interior Design Blogger Could Pull Off

High-school Spanish teacher-turned-interior-decorator Paloma Contreras, who with her husband moved from a carefully tended suburban home to a Montrose townhouse last summer, is selling a number of furniture pieces that aren’t making the cut in the new digs, including the alphabetically labeled items in the top photo above (and, in the other view, the very ottoman beneath her).

As a Houston design blogger of long standing, however, Contreras has a few advantages other would-be furnishings-hawkers might not. For example, the items she’s showing off in the “Huge Blog Sale!” announcement she posted earlier today were photographed in situ in Contreras’s previous home by NYC-based photographer Lesley Unruh for a designer home tour on One Kings Lane last year (where many of them were also included in her “tastemaker tag sale”). Also, there’ll be no Craigslist-y or consignment hassle for Contreras, whose La Dolce Vita website has plenty of local followers: “All pieces will be sold to first person to email me . . . with the item name and your confirmation to purchase. From that time, the interested party will have 1 hour to send payment in full via Venmo.” Oh, and no delivery issues either: “All items are for local Houston pick up only. Pick up will be this Saturday, June 10th. Time, address, and other details will be disclosed to buyer via email.”

Photos: Lesley Unruh

14 Comment

  • The only lower lifeform than a Realtor is an Interior Decorator. Neither job requires a smidge of skills but an overabundance of bovine excriment.

  • Chromophobia!

  • Out of curiosity, where do used car salespeople fit in that hierarchy?

  • The way I see it it’s used car salesmen, then clergy, then realtors, then interior decorators, then that fungus that causes athlete’s foot.

  • Tow-truckers??

  • This seems like an advertisement posing as a story.

  • Since I’m not a dog and have been granted the ability to see/appreciate colors, I’ll pass on the Huge Blog Sale! and the designer.

  • She should move back to suburbia

  • I’m more interested in knowing what the average salary is for an interior designer/blogger vs. a high school teacher? Only one of the two requires an actual education and provides value to society.

  • Disagree with all of the nasty comments. I don’t know this woman from Adam, but she seems to have staged some very nice vignettes. I’m not a designer, but neither am I a suburbanite. I challenge any of you to post pics of your homes that are nicer.

  • 27….. I predict 27 cats run out of the house on W. 20th street when it gets torn down.

  • Why all the rudeness? Interior decorating can be viewed as a type of applied art. People who hire decorators obviously value the skills and services the decorator offers enough to pay their money for it. And why should you care how someone earns their living, especially when it doesn’t hurt you???

  • Michelle, I agree. A good designer can make a huge difference. By good I mean working with a budget and bringing things into what’s tasteful. It is possible to have money but not have taste as many here have said. If I just created the latest invention or app I would be trying to rub shoulders with a like minded and successful crowd. Your house can actually become part of your resume. Proof that you can play with the big guys. Common, I agree with the stealtor idea having seen what little talent it takes.

  • Getting curious about Commonsense’s occupation and interior. He must be quite something, or so he thinks. Instead of just commenting on the pictures or story he goes straight after the person and her profession. Now, I am not a big fan of what I saw in the pictures, but why so nasty? Why that hate? Take a look at the mirror <3