Forget 2024’s TikTok dating mantra: “I’m looking for a man in finance.” Zooey Deschanel found something better: a guy in construction—six-foot-five, with a thing for plaster cornices. Step into the crisply detailed, Georgian-inflected apartment the actor and musician shares with fiancé Jonathan Scott, one half of HGTV’s Property Brothers, and the appeal becomes obvious. For a design fan, getting engaged to a contractor might be the ultimate fantasy. Not only do you find the love of your life—you also get really nice moldings.
And mullioned windows. And French doors. And custom case goods. Not to mention retractable media screens that descend from the ceiling. And kitchen millwork so snugly built you might be tempted to open and shut the cabinets and drawers all day, just for fun. “He won’t stop until everything is perfect,” says Deschanel. “And anything I can think of, he can execute.”
Their downtown Manhattan duplex, steeped in French and English aesthetics, is a richly layered fantasia dressed in floral wallpaper and upholstery, draped with silk balloon curtains, lit by Murano glass, and crowned by—yes—flawless crown molding. But as the couple reveal, that old-world ambience is not actually old at all. Located in a turn-of-the-20th-century building, the unit was a much-neglected, not-so-white box when they first toured it in late 2019.
“It was totally raw and stripped down, like an abandoned 1980s office building,” recalls Scott.
“It was definitely sketch,” agrees Deschanel.
But its promising aspects were not to be denied: a coveted neighborhood, soaring ceilings, generous square footage, and three separate terraces. And who was better equipped to tackle a fixer-upper than Property Brother Jonathan himself?
The couple met in 2019 while filming an episode of Carpool Karaoke alongside their famous siblings, Emily Deschanel and Drew Scott. As stagey as that setup sounded, it sparked real romance. In 2020, the blue-eyed indie icon and the strapping house flipper purchased a nearly century-old house in LA, where they live with Deschanel’s two children, Elsie, 10, and Charlie, 8. That same year, the couple secured this two-level apartment as a pied-à-terre.
Now might be the time to mention that Scott doesn’t wear that tool belt just for show. Despite his fame as a television personality and home-makeover mogul (the brothers have several furnishings lines and a magazine) he’s extremely hands-on with all his projects, known for spotting flaws down to even one eighth of an inch. So, although he already had a go-to contractor in New York—Artie Lange, a fourth-generation home builder and bona fide buddy who had previously worked on some of the television shows—executing this project from across the country was bound to be a challenge. Fortunately, the couple found a partner in New York City–based interior designer Young Huh.
The AD100 talent is known for her deft layering of historic European elements with fresh patterns, livable layouts, and romantic use of color. Her taste and sensibility meshed perfectly with Deschanel, who took the creative lead in the decoration of the home. “Young is brilliant with maximalist style and she really got my aesthetic,” raves Deschanel, a style icon herself who played no small part in introducing a generation of young women to vintage fashion. “It takes a lot of skill to mix patterns and textures and make them feel harmonious.”
Huh says she immediately jibed with the couple’s design direction. “The first thing they told me was, ‘Nothing modern. We want a sense of history and we love color.’ ” The couple also shared Huh’s undying faith in the inalienable right to wallpaper patterns that make the heart race. (The collaboration was such a success that the couple have penned the foreword to Huh’s first monograph, A Mood, a Thought, a Feeling: Interiors, which will be published by Rizzoli next March.)
The private elevator vestibule sets the tone with House of Hackney’s Hollyhock wallpaper—so decked with blooming color, it feels like walking into a confectionery shop. Inside the apartment, a scenic mural by Iksel for Schumacher leads to the great room, where Scott pulled out the stops in designing a dream chef’s kitchen for Deschanel (the family’s primary cook), with sandy pink Ceppo Beige marble and blue-hued cabinetry secreting an abundance of hidden storage.
As Huh notes, Deschanel’s father, Caleb Deschanel, is a renowned cinematographer, so the lighting throughout the home was sacrosanct—no recessed lighting allowed. (“That’s a swear word in our house,” jokes Scott.) Thus, the scheme of thoughtfully layered illumination, including the pair of Grand Central Terminal–worthy pendants in the kitchen (each weighing in the realm of 60 pounds), plaster sconces, custom lampshades, and Deschanel’s beloved Murano chandeliers.
In the living area, Huh took inspiration from Rudolf Nureyev’s legendary 1980s Paris apartment for the room’s pièce de résistance, a custom L-shaped sofa where both Deschanel and Scott (who indeed is six-foot-five) can lie comfortably stretched out. “A sectional is a modern idea,” says Huh, “but we made it feel old-world.” She did so with a mélange of velvet, floral chintz, and what feels like enough fringe, cording, and other passementerie to costume the cast of an opera.
“That was the day Young and I went crazy,” Deschanel laughs. “We were buried in fabric samples. I kept asking, ‘Are we going too far?’ And she just said, ‘Trust me.’ And she was right.”
Scott recalls it somewhat differently: “What was crazy was that, unknowingly, Zooey had picked the most expensive fabrics in the entire showroom.”
“I do have expensive taste,” she admits.
Their bedroom may be the most exquisite of all, featuring a custom bed, an embroidered wall covering by Pierre Frey, and a windowed wall that opens onto a lush terrace, bordered by intricate trelliswork. “It’s so calming and beautiful,” says Deschanel.
It may come as a surprise, but beneath the apartment’s old-world charm and whimsical design lies a core of cutting-edge technology. “It’s the smartest home I’ve ever built,” says Lange with admiration. “That’s all Jonathan. He can be in LA and know the pressure and temperature of the water here.”
“Technology is tucked into everything,” admits Scott, pointing to the hidden retractable screens in both the living and family rooms and the classic-looking but high-tech Yamaha Disklavier grand piano. And, fittingly for a couple who met on Carpool Karaoke, there’s a serious karaoke setup concealed behind custom cabinetry in the living room.
“We had one trip when Jonathan didn’t leave the house for two days,” says Deschanel, laughing. “He was setting up the karaoke machine.”
This story appears in AD’s November issue. Never miss a story when you subscribe to AD.
Extra! Extra! For exclusive "before" photos as well as Huh's and Scott's sources behind the moldings, tilework, and that elephant topiary, read The Design Secrets Behind Jonathan Scott and Zooey Deschanel's NYC Apartment in AD PRO.
