a conversation with Bethany Nauert

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"I always knew I was an artist- it just took me 30 years to get it right. Though I was passionate about working in a creative field, I was not sure exactly how to achieve that goal"






Bethany Nauert is a Los Angeles based photographer that specializes in interior spaces + architecture + portraits. Over the course of the last two years, her career has exploded, and she has taken over photos of over 150+ homes for various publications. When I was doing research for a project last Spring, I kept noticing her name on many of the photographs I was looking at. She has photographed incredible homes + lofts, and some of my favorite Los Angeles showrooms: Obsolete, Lawson-Fenning, and Silver Lake's Mohawk General Store.

I called her up, and we eventually had a long conversation one afternoon over lunch about her career path and her quarter life crisis, and her love/hate relationship with the city that finally welcomed her years after she left.

Thank you Bethany... - David John






Were you always fascinated by design?

Yes, as a matter of fact in grade school I thought wanted to be an architect. I was always reading my parents architectural and design magazines, studying the floor plans and illustrations. I would take a floor plan from one of the magazines, draw a house to go with it, and then draw a photo of the people who live inside the house. I would love to create a whole story about the people that supposedly lived there.


Talk about your quarter life crisis, and how it led you into your current career as a photographer?

I always knew I was an artist- it just took me 30 years to get it right. Though I was passionate about working in a creative field, I was not sure exactly how to achieve that goal and if I really wanted to be a photographer. I left San Francisco after graduation and impulsively decided to move to New York. After two years, several emotional shoot-outs and a few subway induced panic attacks I realized that something was seriously not right. I think in the two years I was there, I maybe did 3 photo shoots total. I worked for a really reputable photographers agency and took some day jobs that were less desirable but paid the bills. However I was exhausted, depleted actually so I moved back to California.

I got a great job working with a commercial photographer in Petaluma, so I moved my way through Berkeley, Oakland and then finally to Santa Rosa. It was during this incredibly dark year, I had to not only rebuild my portfolio but I had been dealing with the end of horrible relationship. I think I sunk all my energy into this personal relationship so that I didn’t have to deal with working on my career. I may or may not have been running away from myself.

I made the decision to move to Los Angeles, in 2006. The irony of all my moves around the country, is that Los Angeles is two hours from my home town San Diego, so perhaps that’s why I tried to go everywhere but here.

This past year has been hugely successful because I replaced any social life or any resemblance of a lover with my obsession of photography. I have no sense of weekend, I work 7 days a week. It literally consumes me, and that's ok for right now.


The attraction to interior spaces?

My interest in interior spaces started with the admiration I felt for a well designed and decorated bedroom. I believe I’ve shot about 150 homes in the past year; the intrigue still lies in the details of a person’s home, and the stories that each room can tell about a person or the family.


Are there any specific homes and/ or spaces you remember?

The most significant house tour I’ve shot so far is the home of Sabrina Ward Harrison. About 10 years ago still in college, I discovered her book “Spilling Open” and it profoundly changed my life. It had such an effect on my own artwork as I began to create with more vulnerability and was less worried about technique. Finally this year I got the guts to send her an email and introduce myself for a house tour. It was incredible to visit the home of someone who impacted your work so greatly. We’ve actually become great friends from the experience, which of course is invaluable.


Projects you are currently involved?

I’m continuously seeking diverse homes to photograph. Not only do I keep my eye out for exceptional spaces for Apartment Therapy, but I’d love to be able to submit them to other publications such as Interiors Magazine, Angeleno Interiors and Dwell magazine. I love shooting for web, but I still have the desire to be featured in print. My most recent shoot for print was a downtown loft tour for Design Bureau Magazine, I ended up in a private infinity pool that overlooked Pershing Square.

Another challenge I’m giving myself right now are creative and lifestyle portraits. I want to shoot real people, artists, designers, influential thinkers and tastemakers. A bulk of my portraits were taken as part of house tours, and I’d love to expand on this section of my portfolio. One project that is near and dear to my heart, (which I am limited to speak about right now) - soon after meeting Sabrina she asked me to shoot some various things for her including her portrait. I’m so grateful because I am going to be part of her next book, with a couple photographic contributions.











Bethany Nauert's site here..

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A conversation with CostelloTagliapietra

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"This was our very first opportunity to design a piece of furniture so admittedly we were like kids in a candy store. Poor Jean (de Merry) had to rope us in a bit!"

Costello Tagliapietra's work in progress for JDM-10

Recently, a very certain chair stole my afternoon attention. It all happened so suddenly. I was walking down the street, when the beast appeared. The chair continued to haunt me, and confuse me! Horns reaching into the air, looping around, with a glittery disco ball underneath a cushion made of fur... Wow. A sudden rush.

The chair I speak of is sitting proudly in the window of the Jean de Merry showroom here in Los Angeles. I was grateful to be offered a full tour of the 10 works that are part of the 10 year anniversary collaboration project for Jean de Merry, and discovered the chair was created by NY fashion designers, Costello Tagliapietra.

I reached out to them in the hopes of understanding more about their process. They were kind enough to send a few sketches of the beast in progress! Their final work will be shown until September 2 in the Melrose Place, Los Angeles showroom. All of the works included in this show are beyond gorgeous, exquisitely crafted, and have a timelessness about them.... Thank you Sean Yashar for inviting YHBHS to see these works in person.


JDM-10. Each guest designer has collaborated with Jean de Merry to create their own limited-edition piece of furniture, casegood or decorative art piece to be sold with 100% of the net proceeds going toward the charity of the artists’ choice. The JDM-TEN participating designers included: Costello Tagliapietra, Oliver Furth, Katherine Heigl, Molly Isaksen, Joe Dahan of Joe’s Jeans, Karolina Kurkova, Kara Mann, Joel Morrison, Irene Neuwirth and Gregory Parkinson. In the new week, I'll post some images of the other works in progress that are included in this show...... All of the photographs are taken by Bethany Nauert... Thank you Bethany....

two sketches of the chair....

There appears to be a sense of freedom in the design of this chair. An over the top element that carries me away, if you will! How did you arrive at the idea for the JDM-10 chair?

This was our very first opportunity to design a piece of furniture so admittedly we were like kids in a candy store. Poor Jean had to rope us in a bit! We really wanted this to be something special unto itself and feel not necessarily ours or JDM but live somewhere in between. What JDM does is so handcrafted which really spoke to the way in which we work, so the chair really came out of that. The computer screen was covered in images ranging from Norwegian death metal photos, vintage photos of hunting cabins to horned animals. In the end we wanted a bit of humor to come through and for the person who sits in it to appear as though the horns were coming out of their head.


Talk about the silver sphere that is mounted underneath the seat? A reference to the past lives of the disco era? What other materials are incorporated?

Personally we have been really drawn to the culture and history of the seventies and early eighties particularly gay culture and how we connect to that history. There is something so iconic about a silver ball, originally we had thought about mercury glass but were thrilled to see Jean interpret it as a disco ball of sorts and we love that the chair has that slightly subversive feel to it almost fetish-y in a way but indefinably so.


Rick Owens, and some other fashion designers have designed some incredible furniture + interiors. Do either one of you have a desire to design more furniture? Have you designed furniture in the past?

It is a huge interest for us. The hope for the clothes we make is that they provide a lasting love to the owner. We hate the idea of seasons dictating what people wear and really hope to create things that live beyond both season and trend. Furniture is something that you must think of in this way, few people have the luxury of changing their furniture seasonally but instead buy things they know they can live with and connect with in a very deep way. There is something really special about that and we would love to see filter into the way people buy everything; collecting rather than consuming.























Jean de Merry & Christian D. Maroselli opened their first showroom in Los Angeles in 2001, but the journey to where they find themselves today can be traced back hundreds of years to the limestone plateaux of the Causse Noir in South Central France. By the 19th Century, the leather tanning process of de Merryʼs ancestors had pioneered and cultivated what came to define this rural location as one of the premiere leather manufacturing regions in Europe. Utilizing long held family secrets; re-creating and refining the process of aging rawhide in order to create hand-crafted goods that look and feel like treasured family pieces, the result was the starting point for the Jean de Merry brand, which resulted in an exclusive, signature line of club chairs. These artisanal pieces are hand-dyed and hand-aged as they were in a wonderful bygone era, when quality and integrity were evidence of a skilled and talented craftsperson.

Today, Jean de Merryʼs visionary line offers flawless execution of subtle palettes, discreet, sophisticated finishes and sleek lines that create a harmonious, artful juxtaposition to the raw beauty of their organically crafted leather pieces. With a strong appreciation and respect for pedigree and community alike, they have created furniture that embodies the classic elements of design while still being original and personal. Never modish but always stylish and relevant, these pieces are the heirlooms of the future. The instinctive and emotional relationship they have with their collection is what defines Jean de Merry as an iconic creative visionary and as an extraordinary brand.













Visit Jean de Merry.
All of the photographs are taken by Bethany Nauert...
Costello Tagliapietra's Fall/ Winter 2011 collection here...








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