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Real Talk with Sterling Real Estate Group is your go-to resource for all things real estate. In our episodes, we break down the latest market trends, share insider tips, and provide expert insights to empower your property journey. Whether you're buying, selling, building, or investing, we're here to help you navigate the dynamic world of real estate in New York's Capital Region and beyond. If you have any questions or topics you’d like us to cover in a future episode, we’d love to hear from you! Reach out to us at info@sterling518.com.
Lisa Licata (00:36)
Hi and welcome to Real Talk at Sterling Real Estate Group. And today I'm very excited to welcome my friend Julie Maleski Putzel of JMP Interiors. Hi, Julie, and welcome. Hi, Lisa. Thanks so much for having me here. It's always a blast when we get together. I know. I know. And you just walked in, right? You walked in one day to bring me flowers from your beautiful property. I did. And I was like,
Why don't you come on the podcast and you graciously agreed. So here we are. Thank you. We always make magic happen. We do. We do. Julie, just so our listeners can get to know you, tell us a little bit about yourself. Sure. Well, yeah, I'm Julie. I own JMP Interiors Founder and it's based out of Ballston Lake, New York. So just around the corner from your office, really. Yeah. But I've been an interior designer for over 25 years. I graduated from Cazenovia College.
And let's see a little bit of background about my business. I've been on this old house George to the rescue I have clients in Italy and all over the country, but really a lot here and I was just the president of the American Society of interior designers. Huge Honor. it was it was beautiful. Huge Honor. Beautiful
term. I loved everything about it, connecting with our membership, because we're the third largest chapter in the country. People don't realize that. We're the only international one. Wow, that's a big undertaking. a lot of coordinating. Wow. A lot of Zooms. Are you done with that role now? I am. You're smiling when you said that. It's a lot of work. It's a lot of work. It's like herding cats. Oh, yeah. There's some obstacles, but it's okay.
trudge through. You do, you do. So tell us a little bit, like what are your design projects that you like to do the most? What really inspires you? Sure. That's a great question. And, you know, for design projects I love to do, it's really about the project itself. So clients innately come to an interior designer because they have a problem. You know, we need to fix and come up with a solution for said problem, whether it's the color in their home.
makes them feel a certain way or their space is an odd transition or they're not really sure how to fix something. So really it comes down to that specific project and that specific client. But my job is to tell their story and solve a problem all at the same time. at the same time. That can be challenging, right? Yeah. And then everyone's personalities, you know, everyone's a little bit different, which, you know, obviously can be hard to navigate. It is and you don't.
I think in general, people don't realize how many filters they have when they say, Julia, I don't understand how to fix this. And then we start diving in, ⁓ but I don't like that. Or I don't like rounds. I don't like curves. OK. I don't like the color purple. OK. So you discover a lot more and you identify with the emotion of the person. Because at the end of the day, we need to connect with our spaces that we're in, whether it's residential or commercial.
And there's a lot of managing people and feelings in that. And that's the story I need to tell. So let me ask you a question. When you sit down with clients and they say, you know, I don't like purple or I don't like round or I don't like this. At the end of the project, has any of those things that they said they didn't like end up being there as you introduced it in your design and your vision? Most of the time, actually, because I don't.
The way I start with a project is I have a discovery call where we identify, ok what is the reason you're calling me, but then let's deep dive into a little bit timeline, budget, all the things. And then when we get there and I get into the space and now I'm conducting my measure and I'm checking on the lighting and all of the physical elements of the space, now I'm asking questions like, okay, so do you like bold color? Are you an ocean person or a mountain person?
how do you organize? I wanna know more about you, the client, so that I can understand triggers that may or may not work in this space. And a lot of times, using the example purple, people think grimace, I may have just dated myself, but McDonald's used to have grimace, and everyone thinks either that or like Concord grape.
Purple and it's like, okay, well, let me show you the shades of purple. So many different variations. you know, sometimes we have a vision and that's why vision boards and mood boards are so important because I could say a word and someone thinks one thing, but showing them an image of what I mean just helps close that gap on that communication. you do vision boards, right? A lot. I've seen a lot of it. You know, I follow you obviously on social media. So I see a lot of your work that you do and I've seen your vision boards and different things that you put together for clients.
And it's a combination. I do a lot of the presentations in PDF form or what have you, but then there's also those physical samples. And one of the services my company provides is I'm coming into your home with samples. I'm not necessarily dragging you through showroom after showroom after showroom. I'm going to bring them into your space so we can see them in your light, in your room. it's the comfort of your home. So now you can give me honest feedback and you don't feel like you have a million eyes.
in some showroom or it's echoey and we can't have a private conversation. Yeah, trying to pick something out. Interesting. Yeah, vision boards definitely. I know for me personally it helps because you're right when you say purple, which I love purple, as a side note, you do think there's just one color. One color purple, but we all know there's thousands of the variation of purple. Let me ask, when you first walk into someone's home,
What's the first thing that you notice that tells you how they live in their space? That's a great question. I think it's a combination of how their wall decor is hung. Oh, really? The smell. OK. And then visual chaos. What level of visual chaos am I dealing with? And those aren't positive or negatives. They're just first impressions. OK. These are the first three things I noticed. example of visual chaos.
Visual chaos. If you have pets and they have their toys or cat scratch posts everywhere. Okay. Yeah. If you have kids and they... Toddlers are notorious for throwing Legos everywhere or their toys are just kind of haphazard all over the place. someone is a pile person, they just have their pile stacked on maybe a side table, their drop zone when they first walk in. I want to see that.
I tell my clients, do not clean before I get there because I need to understand the type of human you are. I can shine a brown paper bag, but if it's not the bag for you, then it's not going to work for your family. I need to see that flow because if you are a pile person, then giving you drawers to put things in, you're never going to use the darn drawers. Right, right, right. So then it's going to waste of money. Let's go with baskets. Yeah, baskets, okay. hide a lot of stuff. I stand corrected.
I think I need a basket for my dog's toys. They're all over. Yeah. We're going to jump into holiday decor because we are, we are into December. When it comes to holiday decor, what's the easiest way to make your home feel festive without going full Santa exploded in the living room.
I think there's a couple of things going on there. And you know, I did write about it in a free downloadable on my website right now. There's 12 different points in the free downloadable you can find on jmpinteriors.com. But a couple of those are, one, create that signature scent because the holidays are all about creating memory, nostalgia, connecting with the people that we love and we want to spend that quality time with.
And a lot of times that relates to a scent. And that could be everything from pine tree scent to apple pie to pumpkin pie. Yeah, okay. So what do you associate scent-wise with the holidays? Have that scent going in your home, whether it's a diffuser or a candle. Another thing to not break the budget, stick with greenery. Garlands, wreaths, little just small little tablescapes of...
cute little bud vase and maybe some holiday pine sprigs in there. Because a lot of times around here, farms even have them for free on the side. So you can clip a few, put them in a little mason jar, put a pretty velvet bow on it. Velvet's one of the trends of the season. really just kind of style it. Probably the last thing I would say is focus on your powder bathroom. Okay. If you need to pick one room, because every guest
is gonna eventually need to use your powder bathroom. So just small little touches in there to make it feel like you're trying to elevate that space, feel special and encouraged and welcome. But that Interesting, and you're not breaking the budget? No. Interesting what you said about the greenery. So instead of focus on, you know-
If you're really trying to squeeze pennies, because let's be honest, everyone has a different budget in this time of year, things are just really expensive and we're trying to make our budget stretch, but don't worry so much about what color is the color of the season, focus on that greenery, because the greenery can then take you into January, it could take you into the spring, so it can be out longer without having to have that Christmas vibe. To switch everything over, yeah. I feel like you go from Christmas and...
to Valentine's Day, you know, and then you jump right in the spring. Easter. Yeah, The greenery, that is a good point. Fresh, right? Fresh and or? Fresh or, I mean, Amazon has some great options you could get like next day and they look really great. I think the thing for finding greenery is make sure it has three different types of pine in it, even if it's faux, you know, so that way you have a mix of needles and it tends to look a little bit more realistic. Interesting.
We're all learning today from that. What holiday styling trends are you loving this year? And which ones should be left in the attic forever? I like that question. I'll answer you the first part. Holiday styling trends focus on a hero piece. So a post I made today on my social was, find that one hero piece. So whether it's you want to focus on that mantle.
It's meant so that when someone is walking into your room, their eye can land. and that's that one statement piece and then the rest of your decor should compliment that one hero piece. So if it's your tree, if it's your mantle, if it's a wreath or your table setting, everything else should be quietly contributing to the hero To the one hero piece. So how would you determine
what that would be. How would... When you walk in your room, what's your favorite part of the room? Is it your fireplace? Is it your dining room table? Is it your stairway? Some people, they may say it's their TV. Okay, so then style around your TV. You treat it kind of like a mantle. But find the one thing that your eye lands to, and if you're not sure what that is, if you squint your eyes a little bit when you go in the room, for those of us that have contacts, we don't need to worry about that.
You can go into a room, squint your eyes a little bit, and what's the thing that your eye always goes to when you go in that room? That's where your hero piece should be. All right. And then style around that. I'm going to try that. Now... That's a good... What happens if you don't have like an open concept? ⁓ thank God. I'm so tired of the open concept. That needs to go away, by the way. That's a whole nother subject. would it be? The living room? Would it be the family room? I think with open concepts, it's more of, you know...
You almost have a duality there, right? So a lot of open concepts. And let's use the family room and the kitchen because that's usually pretty exposed and open together. Treat them for different spaces. So you usually have to turn either your head or your body to look in one area or the other. Very rarely are you going to stand and see both spaces together, even though peripherally they do exist. So treat them separate. So the family room, maybe that's where the tree is. In the kitchen, maybe you're styling around your range hood.
or a slider door, or you're setting up that charcuterie board on the island, you know, things like that. All right, interesting, interesting. For people hosting this season, what are your go-to tips to make the home feel warm and inviting, even on a budget? Well, that's a great question. I do want to comment on your question before, which was which trend or holiday item should be left in the attic? Anything with tinsel.
This year, it may come back. So you mean that pink tinsel that's sitting around, get rid of it? Pink tinsel, the tinsel that used to be garland that people would wrap around their stairways or like their, yeah, that can just, or the hang tinsel that you blew into your tree. Yeah, that you pick and just Again, I may have just dated myself, but you know, that used to be a thing. Yeah, there's some people that are younger age who are probably like, what is tinsel? If you're old enough to be allowed to watch Scrooge. We're looking over. It was in all of the trees at that time. I used to love the tinsel.
Especially that you pick it up and just kind of throw it. It would like electrocute me every time. Really? You you got to zap. Yeah, shock. Anyway. No wonder why you don't like tinsel. I have an issue with tinsel. All right, note to self. If Julie comes over, get rid of the tinsel. Get rid of the tinsel. But your question about what holiday trends this year am I really loving, I'm loving velvet ribbon. It's just so elegant. you can...
absolutely elevate any greenery by even the thin ribbon. It doesn't need to be a big showy bow. A delicate, simple ribbon is really pretty, easy to get. Usually you can find them on sale like, you now because, you know, stores are already put marking things down. And then I think the other thing that's a big trend this year is really making sure your foyer or entry is kind of setting the tone for your client. Well, I say clients, but your
your company to come in and be welcomed into your home. So maybe that's where you have your candle. Maybe it's a little monogram item. Maybe it's a little dish with some holiday candies, just something to really set your entryway up to welcome your guests into your home that sets the stage for the rest of your color palette. Okay, interesting. And for people that have smaller homes, let's say a ranch, 1200 square feet.
how are you setting the entry? Because when you walk in there, there's really not a lot of room to be a hero space. So designing... I would argue with that in how you style it, because you can take a plant stand, we can have a little basket on there, we could have a little candle. So you make it a really special, intentional vignette to really capture the eye, to really ground.
It's just something little that says, welcome to my space. I'm happier here. Please come in. And this is why you're so good at what you do. That's it. You have a solution for everything. I do want to touch base. So for our viewers, we've known each other close to 10 years now. Yes. And I had met you during the showcase of homes. You were one of the designers or you were the designer. Yeah. And we've been friends ever since.
Talked about Boston, you had just moved here from Boston. Right? And you did a lot of salons and everything there and look at, you know, here you are now. Yeah. What was it? I guess 15 years ago or so, I designed every salon on Newbury Street. I had clients on the Cape building back then. That was the start of the boom of the McMansions that are down there now. Yeah. And then the clients that were out in the Berkshires. yeah. And you keep yourself busy. I do want to touch base on
your new home and your new venture with the flowers and everything. I know we were talking a little bit off camera, off mic before we started, but it's just beautiful what you do and you sell, right? You sell your flowers. Do you want to tell our listeners a little bit about that? Sure. My cut flower farm, during COVID, we relocated to a different school district to better support our son who has a little bit of a learning disability.
And when we did that, we moved to a property that has 16 acres. And through COVID, I had just had our youngest, who's now five. But I wasn't able to go into anybody's home as an interior designer. And I needed to just for my own mental sanity, do something. So I started growing seeds. I had never really planted anything before. And it became just this.
thing I latched onto and I needed to grow everything that could grow in our zone. So I just started having all these plants all over the place. And when we moved to our new home, my husband built me a 55 by 75 garden. And now I do flowers for weddings and private events. I will grow seeds for the bride for her color scheme.
specifically in an area of our garden that she can come and watch them grow and then take photos in before the wedding, before everything gets cut for her ceremony. ⁓ I didn't know that. See, that's something new we learned today. Yeah. So I have special. yeah. Everything is in that area for that wedding. So I have over three thousand Dahlia. I have over eighty five rose, rose bushes. I have over seventy five peony. I think I have.
I have about what, 35-ish perennial mums. And then really what gets grown in the cut flower area is everything the deer, rabbit, or chipmunks would want to eat. But it's all cut flowers. start everything from seed. Everything's organic. And right now I have six different types of eucalyptus started and 12 different types of Lysianthus, which kind of looks like a rose. Right. How do people find, if they go on the JMP Interiors website?
Will they find information there about? They will do that. I think more right now it was on Instagram. So I need to add more to the website. Layers, Lisa, layers. yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, we're going to make sure we have all of your contact information and social media handles. Everything will be embedded in the show so people can certainly find you.
Sorry for like going off the rails there, but that's a huge undertaking and I want to be sure that people knew Oh yeah, and you know do weekly bouquets, we do flowers for restaurants, little Budvases at tables. I've done Budmitzvahs and all little celebrations, celebrations of life, baby showers, you name it. Yeah, that's nice. You did showcase the awards night. Yeah, ceremony awards That was a big undertaking for the, I mean, 300 plus people.
You know the hardest part about that though, was I didn't account for the way the, at that venue they have stage lighting with different colors. Well the colors of the lights rendered the flowers differently. So I selected colors based on the theme of the showcase and then when we got in there the colors of the lights rendered my flowers differently. I mean they still look great, but I was irritated as a designer, I'm going gosh darn it.
I planned that to pop, now you don't even see it. And everyone was like, the flowers are beautiful. Yeah, they So you're looking at it from a different way. And everyone, you know, I heard all the compliments and everything. So yeah, that was a great job. So Julie, you mentioned earlier that you have a downloadable. Yes, style guide, a holiday style guide. on your website. But you do have your holiday styling guide. What inspired you to do that?
I get a lot of questions from my own existing clients. A lot of times they send me a text message, you know, how do I style this space or, and they just want to dress it up for their family or guests coming in. And usually it's a forgotten hallway or the entryway, you know, powder room. We don't necessarily want to spend a lot of money in those places, but we want, other than just buying a little hand towel, what else can I do in those spaces? So it really came down.
to that and then collecting what is this year's kind of go-to little tricks and tidbits. So it's 12 tips to design like a, or to decorate like a designer for the holiday season. That's great. And I know before we were talking, you did say you already have on your website the 2026 design trends. I am going, yeah, I'm going to be adding that. So the...
Yeah, I'm going to be writing a blog and then a free downloadable that is the 2026 Design Trends. And then each month I'll go into depth on one trend at a time by visiting showrooms, doing a little video and reviewing. You because there's lighting trends, there's paint trends, there's furniture trends, there's decor trends, you know. And what's our color trend for 2026? You will find out. Our color of the year.
I think that depends on whose color of the year you're going by. Oh, okay. Because Pantone has one, Benjamin Moore has one, Sherwin-Williams has one. You know, all the paint companies have their version. So depending think it was Pantone. that like the... Cloud something. Cloud catcher or something like that. Which is white. It's stupid. I think it That's my opinion. How do you really feel about that color, Julie? I think I looked at it. I was like, oh, I can't wait to see what that looks like. I can't wait to be in a hospital and Yeah, it's a variation of a white. Yeah.
I'm like... Now, I love white. I'm not saying white is not good, but for crying out loud, if I wanted to go to hospital, I'd go to a hospital. I don't want to be surrounded by white walls. you know, anyway, that's another topic for another time, I guess. All right. And lastly, for fun, what's the one design rule you'd love to break during the holidays or one rule you think everyone should stop following? I'm going to go with the first part.
of the question, which is what design rules should they break? And this can actually apply any time of year, but specifically around the holidays. And I'll tell you why. And it comes to an heirloom piece or the collectibles that we've either kept from childhood, they're sentimental, they probably look like hell, but we put them out anyway because they remind us of our grandma or what have you. for me, I know it's...
totally not what maybe other people would collect, but I collect those ceramic trees that have the little lights on them. ⁓ yeah. Like the ones that maybe your mom or grandma made. Like they're vintage at this point. They're cracked. I mean, some of them don't even work. have one from my parents that is fully intact. you know, does that go with any of the trends? Absolutely not. But the way you take something like that, that doesn't go by any trend, but you love it anyway. Put it out.
but make it a collection. So, nutcrackers is another really good example. Some people really collect a lot of nutcrackers or snow globes. Make a collection out of them instead of trying to fan it all out so that that way it reads as intentional. If we try to take something that is kind of off color or not really our style anymore and spread it throughout, it just looks like a hodgepodge of decor where... Interesting.
If you take that collection and, okay, maybe I have 12 nutcrackers, great. Find an area that you can create a really great display, but now it reads as a collection as opposed to culture, skelter, right. That's a good tip. That's a really good tip. Now I'm sitting here going, I have my snowmen all over.
And some people it's I'm home and restyle. And it's okay too. I shouldn't say you can't mix it throughout the room, but make sure that if you're gonna mix it out, you have enough of them together so it reads as a collection. So that way, if let's say you have 50 Nutcrackers, you put five over here, style in odd numbers. It always looks more cohesive in odd numbers. So take odd numbers here, odd numbers there, but that way they read as pops of a collection as opposed to random all over the place.
Interesting style and odd numbers. A lot of people probably go with even, correct? So everything is balanced. Wow, we're learning a lot today. See this? You're gonna come back, right? We're gonna have you back. What do wanna talk about in the next podcast? I think the next podcast absolutely would be those trends for 2026. There's a lot of different things coming in and some of them are very opposing so they can be very confusing to...
someone just trying to style their home or have a fresh take because we're talking cloud catcher is one, which is a variation on a white, but then maximalism in color is another trend coming in. we're going to have- is that? No, maximalism, think very saturated, very jammy, rich patterns and over the top. So those are naturally conflicting. So it could be tricky to be able to pair that and-
That's why it's kind of like when you think about fashion, like on a runway. There's a whole lot that comes out for trends that doesn't mean all of them are going to stick with you, but we got to pick and choose. Which one that you like. And then make it applicable to our spaces. Right. Well, wonderful. We're going to get you back on in January. Is there anything that you want to mention that we maybe have missed in this particular podcast? I think the only thing that I would say is don't be afraid to reach out to a qualified interior designer.
Every designer runs their business differently. Some have minimums for what they'll take. I don't. I'm just hourly. And I have different ways I can work with a client. just like when your tooth hurts, you go to a dentist. If you're stuck in your home, find a good interior designer, a true interior designer to be able to help you. Because someone will. Yeah. And I know you will, of course. Do you want to tell our listeners how they can get a hold of you? And we're also going to put your contact information in our show Sure.
Yep, you can review my website. It's jmpinteriors.com. My email is julie@jmpinteriors.com And then my cell phone, 570-401-4402. And I'm on Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn, and my Google Business page. All right, wonderful. And we'll make sure that's all in the show notes. And Julie, thank you so much for coming in. Get you in, maybe end of January, beginning of February. Sure. We'll book that before you leave.
Love That will be great. I can't wait to have you back.
Julie Maleski Putzel (27:53)
And that concludes another episode at Real Talk with Sterling Real Estate Group. Thank you.