Home Furnishings Heaven with Hot Haute Hot
Hot Haute Hot is one of the most fashionable and eclectic furniture stores you’ll come across; and luckily for us, it is located right in Pittsburgh’s equally colorful Strip District. Rose Smith and Keneva Kennedy, the co-owners, have compiled a soulful collection of hand-picked designs from all over the world. Hot Haute Hot designs mix vintage, modern, and travel inspired pieces that are collected in a whimsical and unconventional showroom that changes weekly.
With talented designers on staff, unlimited resources, and years of experience in all trends of design, Hot Haute Hot helps relieve the stress of decorating and interior design by walking their clients through the process of making a space truly unique.
Maniac Magazine: How did it all begin?
Hot Haute Hot: We opened in 1999. We had a love of collecting and curating our own homes with one of-a-kind pieces and wanted to share that designing and decorating passion.
MM: What is your collective background in design?
HHH: We have a graphic design degree and a business degree between us, but more importantly, it is combined love for design and decorating. We saw that Pittsburgh did not have homes reflecting a globe trotter style—a style where you’ve traveled everywhere and collected all the things that you love and put them together in one space.
MM: Aside from your shops world traveler vibe, how would you describe your aesthetic?
HHH: It is a mix of modern and vintage. This may sound redundant, but we have things that we love. Several designs are heirloom pieces and have pasts with an incredible stories behind them. Imagine the story behind the reclaimed shutters from India! That separates us from other designers in terms of being mass-produced.
MM: How do you get pieces to work together?
HHH: Our styles are fairly similar so we try to find pieces that can transition from room to room. If someone has a home that is mostly classical in its furnishings, they can infuse one of our pieces to give the space its own unique sense of style and personality. It is really wonderful to have the opportunity to bring a global style into the design arena of Pittsburgh so that the people here can actually enjoy it, too.
MM: When did you start to actually go into people’s homes and design room by room?
HHH: From the very beginning. We didn’t have a formal way of doing it, it happened organically. In the last five years, people began calling us to work on a few pieces and before we knew it, the clients started to want everything redone from head to toe. Another aspect of our design is the commercial community. We worked with two restaurants in Sewickley called Mambo Italia and Lula, and the clients that go there and dine come back to us and tell us they want their home to have the same feel as the restaurants. People feel transformed in the restaurant because it has a sense of home to it.
MM: What advice would you give to someone that’s just starting the process of furnishing their home?
HHH: They have to figure out what is important to them and where they spend most of their time in their home. Our co-worker Audrey has an interior design degree, so when we get in deep with a project, including blueprints, wiring, and tile, she’s involved in all of that as well. So it depends on what level of attention that customer needs. But with any renovation, after you’re done with one job, we’ll get another call soon after to do something else. If their dining room has been designed and we finish it, the next thing we know, we’re getting calls to come do the powder room or the office. It is a constant evolution of style and creativity.
MM: You guys seem to always be going through an evolution, in that your showroom is always changing!
HHH: We do that all the time! The really funny about this store is you can come in one week and then the next time you come in, it’s completely different.
MM: What other pieces, aside from furniture, do you carry in the store?
HHH: We have a great gift category that includes everything from jewelry to candles. What’s nice about shopping small is that a lot of the money goes back into this community. It serves local businesses and that’s huge!
MM: What makes the pieces at Hot Haute Hot so special?
HHH: Our products are one of a kind and once they are gone, they’re gone. There are so many pieces can serve different purposes depending on your personal style. A shutter can easily become a table top. Reclaimed old structures that are being salvaged easily become beautiful pieces of art and that’s where we shine. We love reclaimed work and it’s huge right now.
MM: It seems like you carry pieces that are unique in style and no matter what the style of the house; the piece fits like an individual statement.
HHH: People could have a modern/contemporary home and yet they’re going to put that one carved piece from India in one of their rooms, and out of every other decoration in their home, somebody’s going to make a comment about that piece.
There is no shortage of statement pieces at Hot Haute Hot. They’ll help you craft a space that, without their helpful guidance, makes items that would seem to contrast on paper, compliment each other perfectly in your home. For that perfect mix of personality and style, there’s no place in Pittsburgh that will fulfill your design needs quite like them.
In the end, put your trust in Rose and Keneva; “We get it. We get it. We get it. We promise.”
They really do.
