The Year of Steven Favreau

It's all coming together for Steven Favreau. The bi-coastal design entrepreneur and former reality television star is upping his game in 2016 with his innovative tenure as Robert Allen brand ambassador. Favreau will spend the next 12 months or so preaching the gospel of the company's fine fabrics and furniture to the design community at trade shows and markets across the country as well as some consumer events. Entitled "My Year with Robert Allen," the first-of-its-kind partnership is a result of Favreau's longtime love for the company's products and promises to be infused with his intensely creative, often irreverent sensibilities.

It's Show-Biz, Folks

Take for example Favreau's dramatic, whimsical appearance at the Robert Allen showroom during Design Week in Boston last October. Hidden under covers in a bed as the audience milled about, he leapt up - causing startled shrieks - and dashed behind it when his alarm clock trilled. "I stripped down and threw my jammies over the top of the bed Mae West-style as I talked to them about Robert Allen," Favreau describes. "After I dressed I came out and continued my talk, 'Custom without the Chaos,' which is about how easy it is to use the Robert Allen product. It focuses on their furniture lines and upholstery, but we'll also be talking about new products. For example, they just came out with a fabric line called Drenched in Color - there's a line of beet color, one called Mussel - so we'll be talking about how they can be used."

With the theatrical component of his appearances Favreau appears to have come full circle. A singer and dancer, he spent the first years of his adult life performing at places like the legendary Moulin Rouge. After art training at the Fashion Institute of Technology, Favreau worked in public relations while exploring his aesthetic in his own homes. In 2006 he hung out his interior design shingle in San Francisco, following up with a Boston office in 2012 and in between appearing on HGTV's "White Room Challenge." A Beantown area native, he owns a house in Vermont but lives in San Francisco with his husband, molecular biologist Gary Decad. In short, the charming Favreau seems just as fabulous as his designs - which is pretty damn fabulous.

On the Edge

A fan of American history, Favreau finds inspiration everywhere, from Boston's no-nonsense Paul Revere House to the lush elegance of Art Deco. "I love the idea of taking traditional styles from the past 200 years and blowing them up in scale, color, volume and concept," Favreau details. "If you look at my Vermont home you see that. I took what would be a very simple stripe and blew it up really wide and bold and hot. And the same with the dining room - enormous, over-scale patterns. I like to get my designs to the point where they vibrate on the edge, as if it's going to tip to the point of 'Oh, that's way too much' - but it doesn't quite go there."

His Favorite Year

In addition to industry-only trade shows, Favreau will be making appearances accessible to the general public, as he did at last November's Boston Home D�cor Show. But should you miss them, he has some thoughts for DIY designers on what's trending this year. "I think there's something about the industrial chic style that's different now," Favreau says. "It has an Americana feel, sort of the Ralph Lauren Wild West thing...weathered woods, and heavy wrought irons are really in this year. We're also seeing a ton of vibrant jewel tones that I think are really going to take hold. Green is going to be huge."

"And hair on hide is still going crazy," Favreau continues, "so I'm excited to see what happens with that next. Lots of textures, too - texture on texture. I love things that vibrate on the edge and you can do that without even going into extreme color. This year is about everybody pulling up their bootstraps and looking for something that makes them excited, so I think 2016 will be the year of innovation in interior design."

After a pause he adds, chuckling, "That really fits into my aesthetic, so who knows? Maybe this is the year of Steven Favreau as well."