WAG first met Geoffrey Walsky in late 2016.
Our January 2017 story focused on his design work through both the Fairfield Co. Antique & Design Center in Norwalk and Iconic Modern Home, his own on-site selection of vintage wares that extended to a presence in a Greenwich art gallery.
Since we spoke, the founder and creative director of Iconic Modern Home has fine-tuned the business — now fully based in Norwalk — on a path of continual growth, particularly in the field of luxury home staging.
Impressed by Walsky’s national appearance on NBC’s “Today,” headlining a segment on “Secrets to Staging Your Home” and receiving a steady flow of email updates featuring Iconic Modern Home’s sophisticated staging projects, we knew it was time to check back in.
We sat down on a recent morning with Walsky, settling in for a chat in Iconic Modern Home’s own well-appointed showroom within the center — and were quickly taken into a fast-paced world filled with sourcing distinctive furniture and accessories, staging million-dollar homes throughout the tristate region — with the Hamptons an area of particular growth — and, yes, a happy home life that continues in Weston with his wife and now 5-year-old twins.
Iconic Modern Home has carved a niche that it continues to define.
With so many new homes being built or longtime properties now coming to market, they are often staged in a familiar, cookie-cutter way.
His company, Walsky notes, offers something unique — “We’re going custom.”
Antiques are real. Art is thoughtful. All comes together to create a one-of-a-kind setting that allows the potential buyer to see the space in a most livable light.
And, he adds, builders and real estate agents — his main contacts — continue to appreciate Iconic Modern Home’s breadth, from a network that allows it to source distinctive furnishings to providing interior-design work such as upholstery or art placement to the clincher — in most cases, work is done with a one-day installation.
The result, he continues, is also something that really “resonates with the buyer,” who can then see himself in such memorable surroundings.
The hectic pace to reach that point is a challenge, though a welcome one.
“The more we’re busy, the stronger our resources,” Walsky says, as it allows him to continue to build relationships with everyone from antiques sources to fine craftsmen.
Having a buying power “so broad,” he adds, “has always been our strength.”
Often, Walsky notes, homebuyers even go on to purchase the furnishings they have seen. The connection has been made.
“I have a very modern aesthetic and, while the furnishings are very modern, it’s very warm,” he says.
Iconic Modern Home is definitely getting its name out there, recently securing its largest project to date, a $15 million waterfront home in Water Mill coming to market for the first time in some 15 years. There was also the chance to work with the Hamptons International Film Festival.
Teresa Kratzman, who officially joined Iconic Modern Home as COO and head of business development soon after we last spoke, adds of that high-profile, celebrity-filled project, “We had the perfect opportunity to stage their spaces.”
While day-to-day elements keep Iconic Modern Home busy — with Walsky next planning to break into the hospitality sector — he continues to oversee the 5-year-old antiques center, a 20,000-square-foot former warehouse filled with vintage and antique furnishings, jewelry, art and more.
“The center’s been great,” Walsky says of the multidealer destination. “People love it… It’s been a great complementary business.”
After all, poking around from booth to booth reminds Walsky of his early days, antiquing with his French-born mother, but now there’s a new sensibility.
Gone, he says, are “the years when I was a kid, when you used to tiptoe around and couldn’t touch anything… Here, you can have fun.”
It also offers a singular experience, one we’d say also seems to reflect the heart of Iconic Modern Home.
As Kratzman says, “Who doesn’t love to be around beautiful things?”
Iconic Modern Home and the Fairfield Co. Antique & Design Center have announced a move, relocating to 39 Knight St. in Norwalk as of Jan. 1. For more, visit iconicmodern.comand fairfieldantiqueanddesign.com.
