Unreasonable Hospitality (and How to Design a Home That's Ready for People)

We have an open door policy for our teenagers, which means I almost never know how many people I'm feeding. Dinner is a moving target. Somebody's friend is staying, then two friends, then a friend's older brother who just got off work. It makes planning nearly impossible and I wouldn't change it, because I want every person who comes through our door, whatever their age or reason for being here, to feel like there was already a place for them.

It's the same reason I always buy too much. For any party we host, I shop for more people than said yes, because somebody unexpected always turns up, and the worst version of hosting is the one where a guest can tell they weren't accounted for. And when I do know exactly who's coming, I want one thing in the room that belongs only to them. A personalized place setting. A welcome basket put together around what that person actually likes rather than a generic one. It's an unreasonable amount of thought for something nobody asked for, and that's the point.

Here's what I've come to believe after years of doing this in my own home and in other people's: almost none of that feeling comes from how a room is decorated. It comes from anticipation. And a surprising amount of anticipation can be built right into a house.

Start at the Door

The entry is where most homes quietly fail their guests. Somebody arrives holding a coat, a bag, a bottle of wine and a phone, and there is nowhere to put any of it. So they stand there holding everything while you talk, or they set their things on the stairs and feel like they've made a mess.

A good entry takes things off people within about five seconds. That means a surface at the right height for a casserole dish or a purse, hooks or a closet that's actually reachable rather than jammed with your own coats, and a spot on the floor where shoes can go without becoming a pile. It doesn't have to be a big room. Some of the best entries we've designed are four feet of wall with a narrow console, a mirror and a pair of hooks. What matters is that the house helps the person who just walked in.

Seat More People Than Live There

Most furniture plans are built for the family and then strained by everyone else. The fix isn't a bigger sofa, it's flexibility. A pair of chairs light enough that a teenager can drag one to the table without asking. An upholstered ottoman that's a footrest most days and a seat on Thanksgiving. A bench at the end of an island. A dining table that extends, or one you sized a little generously to begin with.

The same goes for where people actually gather, which is the kitchen, no matter how beautiful the living room is. Design a place for guests to stand and hold a drink that is not in the cook's path. That one decision changes how every party in that house feels, because nobody has to be shooed out of the way.

The Guest Room Test

Here's the test I use, and you can run it tonight. Go sleep in your own guest room. You'll learn everything in about ten minutes.

The things guests need and will never ask for: a place to set an open suitcase that isn't the floor or the bed, a lamp they can reach from the pillow with an outlet right next to it, a phone charger already plugged in so nobody has to dig through a bag at midnight, one empty drawer and a few empty hangers in the closet, a hook on the back of the door for a robe or a towel, a mirror they don't have to share with the family bathroom, and water.

Two more that guests always mention. Write your wifi network and password on a small card and leave it on the nightstand, so nobody has to come find you to ask. And if you can, put a television in the room that a guest can log into with their own streaming accounts. It sounds like a small thing, but being able to pick up the show they were in the middle of at home is the difference between staying somewhere and settling in.

The empty drawer and the empty hangers are the smallest gestures in the world, and they tell someone they can unpack, which is really another way of saying stay.

Buy for the Person Who Wasn't Expected

Every one of those ideas is a version of the same instinct as buying too much food. You prepare for a little more than the situation requires, because the moment somebody needs something and it's already there is the moment they feel taken care of. An extra chair, an extra blanket, an extra place at the table. Nobody notices the abundance. They just notice that nothing was awkward.

The Same Standard Applies to the People You Hire

Here's where I'll turn the corner, because if you're renovating, you are about to invite a whole group of people into your home for months, and you should be thinking about hospitality in that direction too.

Anyone can look good on an easy project. Orders arrive, the schedule holds, everyone is pleasant. The real information is in how a team behaves on a bad day, so when you're interviewing designers or builders, ask them to tell you about a project where something went wrong. Listen for whether they spent the story explaining why it wasn't their fault, how fast they got someone to the house, and whether the fix was the minimum or the right one. That answer will tell you more than any portfolio.

So here's ours. We had clients who had just closed on a home, with movers scheduled to deliver everything they owned that same day. That morning we found water damage in the hardwood near a door that hadn't been latching properly. Not our door and not our damage, and completely beside the point, because a family was a few hours from moving in and the floor was ruined. I'll be honest about how that feels: there is no version of that morning where you get to be calm because you have a good process.

What we had was a hardwood team we could call and ask for a favor. They were there the same day to pull up the damaged boards. We managed the replacement start to finish and, while they were in the house, had them correct a few other spots that had nothing to do with the water, because if we were going to be in it we were going to leave the whole floor right. Our team made sure the family's furniture was protected and stayed in constant communication so they never had to wonder what was happening in their own home. On the days we knew the work would be especially disruptive, someone from our team brought treats by. Not because a schedule called for it, but because they were living inside construction in a house they had just bought and somebody should say out loud that that's hard.

I'm not telling you that story to suggest we're perfect. Things go wrong on our projects. Pieces arrive damaged, materials get discontinued, dates move, and I have made hard phone calls I wish I hadn't had to make. What I can promise is what happens next, and that's the part we actually built a company around.

Why It Has to Be Built In

You cannot run on caring alone. Caring is what you have on a calm Tuesday. In the week when three projects get hard at once, good intentions are the first thing to go, so hospitality has to be structural or it disappears exactly when someone needs it. In our studio that means communication has an owner, the schedule has an owner, and the hundred small logistics of ordering, tracking, receiving and inspecting have an owner who is never the homeowner.

It also means the favor we called in on those floors wasn't luck, and I couldn't have bought it that morning. Our trades, vendors, contractors and installers get the same treatment we're trying to give our clients: clear information up front, decisions made on time, complete drawings, invoices paid when we said we'd pay them, and real respect for the fact that they know their craft better than I do. We've worked that way for years, so when we call on a bad morning, they come. Clients feel the result of those relationships without ever seeing where they came from.

Whether you're setting a table or building a house, it's the same idea. Think about the person before they arrive, prepare for a little more than you were asked for, and be ready for the day that doesn't go to plan.

And if you'd rather not be the one lying awake wondering whether there's enough seating, well, that's what we're here for.