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has an unexpected scalloped wood trim along its base. "It's playful and modern in a room with this really old, historic fireplace," she says. "I love it so much." Almost all the major seating pieces are custom, a practice Curtis considers nonnegotiable. "I can't remember the last time a sofa wasn't completely custom," she says. Scale and proportion, she explains, are foundational to neuroaesthetics and contribute to the feeling of ease that good design produces. Antiques and one-of- a-kind finds sourced from Round Top, 1stDibs, and the Art Deco-influenced Ebony Home give the interiors a collected, lived- in feeling, as if they were gathered over decades rather than assembled at once. For Robertson, the house represents an evolution. The first was her finding her way toward a personal style, Curtis says; this one is entirely her own. "I don't need the kind of home that's for everybody else," she told Curtis. Instead, she wanted something more deeply reflective of who she is. The result is a singular house not easily categorized. It sits between old and new, formal and relaxed, luminous and moody: It could only be hers. For Curtis, who learned early — and at considerable cost — that beauty is not a luxury but a lifeline, there is no other way to work. From the custom sofas and chaises to the salvaged limestone fireplace, the soul of this house cannot be found in a catalog or copied from a feed. "What is rare is remembered," she says. 86