Designer bridges Harlem with mainstream

(CNN) -- Sheila Bridges, one of the hottest interior designers in the country, is also one of the leading players in the renaissance under way in Harlem. The most celebrated recent arrival to the historic African-American neighborhood is former President Clinton, who hired Bridges in May to decorate his office in a building on 125th Street.

"The construction's still going on, but it feels light, it feels open, it feels accessible," said Karen Tramantono, Clinton's chief of staff. "Those are the recommendations that Sheila made with (Clinton's) feelings about how he wanted it to appear."

The 36-year-old designer is a native of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of a dentist and a schoolteacher. She studied at the Parsons School of Design in New York and worked for various Manhattan firms before she moved into the historic Graham Court building in Harlem in 1993, turning her seven-room apartment into a design showcase and making it the headquarters for her own business.

"There's nowhere else in the world that's really recognized the contributions that African-Americans have made, you know, socially, artistically. So I wanted to be in that neighborhood," Bridges said.

Her timing was good. New York has invested millions of dollars during the past few years into revitalizing Harlem. Once a mecca of black culture, Harlem was long neglected after drugs and crime started it on a downward spiral in the 1960s.

Although Bridges' reach extends beyond Harlem, her work transforming interiors of some of the neighborhood's downtrodden buildings into upscale, urban homes gives her a unique place among designers.

"I think there's a personal commitment on her part to see this neighborhood grow, flourish and realize all of its potential," said Derek Johnson, the president of Harlem's Apollo Theater and the owner of a townhouse decorated by Bridges.

Besides Clinton and novelist Tom Clancy, Bridges' high-profile clients include rapper Sean Combs, former Motown Records President Andre Harrell and software executive Peter Norton.

"She did exactly what I needed, which was something that many decorators cannot execute. I needed her work to be in the background, so that the art could be the hero," said Norton, whose high-rise apartment is filled with modern art.

Although she has been called "the black Martha Stewart," Bridges said her understated, classic style goes beyond any one segment of the population.

"Being African-American is obviously a very big part of who I am," she said. "But I think my design is about good design."

Many seem to agree. Her work often is featured in top design and fashion magazines, and her small but growing empire includes a retail outlet in upstate New York and a book deal with Little Brown. "Furnishing Forward: A Practical Guide to Furnishing for a Lifetime" is set for publication in 2002.

"I wrote this book because I wanted again to make design accessible to people who feel like, you know, 'I can't afford an interior designer,' " she said. "Sheila Bridges Design is about accessible design, a design that is comfortable, that is livable, but that's also beautiful and elegant at the same time."

Her dream is to make her design style a national commodity.

"The business part is just as important as the creative part," Bridges said.

As an African-American woman running her own business, Bridges said she found it challenging in the beginning to overcome stereotypes. "A lot of it had to do with not really having a mentor, who was paving a way in an industry with very few African-Americans," she said.

Now she is enjoying the fruits of her success, even as she strives to achieve more. On weekends, she rides her horse, Red, at her 13-acre estate perched high on a cliff above the Hudson River. Her country home is a refuge from the stress of being in high demand.

"I've worked very hard for the things that I have," Bridges said. "I think it's a testimonial to the fact that if you do have a passion and are very clear about that and work very hard, that it is achievable."