THE ART OF BEAUTY

Amy Kehoe, co-founder of Nickey Kehoe, creates beautiful, intentional interiors shaped by her North Shore roots.

If you’ve ever flipped through an issue of Architectural Digest, you have most likely seen the work of Nickey Kehoe, the interior design firm launched by Todd Nickey and Amy Kehoe. Best friends since meeting in the early 2000s, the duo launched Nickey Kehoe in 2004. Two stores, one in Los Angeles in 2008 and one in New York City in 2024, followed. The duo is known for creating intimate, one-of-a-kind curated spaces that reflect a beauty infused with individuality and creativity.

“Beauty,” a word that Kehoe often uses, describes Kehoe herself. Not only is she “cool girl” gorgeous in her own right, but Kehoe speaks of her background, experiences, and work so articulately that it is hard to remember she is an interior designer and not a poet.

Design seemed almost inevitable for Kehoe. Maybe it began at Winnetka’s Crow Island School—one of the first modernist elementary schools in North America—or later at Tulane, where, as she recalls, “my jam was the quiet streets in the French Quarter, looking at the architecture.” It could have been her year at the Sorbonne, when walks through Paris left her “awe-inspired, just looking at all of the beauty, everywhere.”

Born at Evanston Hospital and raised in Winnetka, Kehoe credits the North Shore environs for cultivating her design instincts. Growing up on Sheridan Road, she recalls her home was “refined, but on a budget.” Kehoe learned early on how to create beautiful spaces and remembers shopping with her mother’s best friend, interior designer Susan Schmidt, to choose pieces for her bedroom.

She credits her North Shore childhood for creating a “wandering eye” for architecture. She and her sister would ride their bikes through the neighborhood, admiring the myriad architectural styles, some restrained, others extravagant. “We had a friend growing up who had a saloon in their basement, and then there were homes that were simple, and equally as beautiful.” It was then that she learned that “beauty was how something made her feel, not what was expected.”

On weekends, Kehoe and her sister went to Chicago to stay with their grandmother. “Every Friday night, our parents would drive us into the city. The ride was meditative. Taking in all the houses, the Tudor-style apartments. In those buildings, you could see the beauty in how people lived.” Her grandmother’s place in Rogers Park was lovely, and while it was not the style for which Kehoe would later become famous, it made a powerful impression. “It was so opulent, not at all my aesthetic. But what I remember about it most is the pride she had putting it all together, how mindfully everything was done. And so, this is how I look at my own design. I try to be thoughtful, mindful of everything.”

Kehoe returns to Winnetka with her son twice a year to visit her family and to indulge in the thing she misses. “I joke with my friends that I live in L.A. but spend more time on the beach when I am in Illinois. It is just so easy here, so relaxed. We ride our bikes around town, stop into Foodstuffs, eat at Mino’s (where the husband of Kehoe’s best friend is head chef), and of course, we always must go to a Cubs game.”

When asked to share the three things of which she is most proud, the answers come easily for her. “First is being a mom. The second is my partnership with Todd. It is a life-force relationship that I am so proud of, and all that we have accomplished together. The third would be the opening of our store in New York. It was truly a dream to go back there and do that.”

Which, of course, leads to one final question: Any chance of her coming home, to open a store on the North Shore someday? “Well, I have always said, work hard and do not overexpose, but I would love it. So, I will never say ‘never.’” Crossing fingers that she really means, “coming soon.”

For more information about Nickey Kehoe, visit nickeykehoe.com.

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AMY’S FAVORITE NICKEY KEHOE PRODUCTS