Decorator as Detective

Have you ever seen something in a magazine that you desperately wanted but hadn’t a clue where to find?

Los Angeles decorator Lorraine Van Zee heard that sad refrain from customers enough times that she started a home furnishings sleuthing business, Interior Design Resource, (800) 290-7467. “My clients use magazines like Architectural Digest as if they were catalogues,” Van Zee says.

She tracks down whatever they desire: sofas, lamps, fabrics and, in once instance, antique brass-wire bird cages pictured in a 1990 edition of Metropolitan Home magazine. She located them in Maine and had them shipped to California.

Van Zee charges 15% of the sticker price for her services.