Edited to Perfection

Nearly 30 years after his original design, interior designer Glenn Gissler returns to refresh this shingle-style home.

It’s rare that a house decorated almost three decades ago still pleases its owner, but such is the case of the Water Mill home belonging to Caroline Hirsch, the founder of the comedy club Carolines on Broadway and the New York Comedy Festival.

In the 1990’s Hirsch hired architect Francis Fleetwood to build her a classic shingle style house like those designed by McKim, Mead & White. “It’s a true shingle” Hirsch says. “We tried to keep it as authentic as we could.” Craving an equally timeless interior, Hirsch tapped interior designer Glenn Gissler to decorate the inside in a style befitting the architecture. Gissler drew inspiration form the Arts & Crafts movement and American Mission style to design a beach house with greater richness and depth than the usual white-on-white seaside decor. The effect was both of it’s moment and timeless.

Gissler and Hirsch became friends through the process, and Gissler has continued to update the house in the ensuing years, keeping it current for Hirsch’s lifestyle. Back in 2010, Gissler oversaw the expansion of the covered deck and patio and addition of a pergola. He also added furnishings to host outdoor dinner parties of up to 50 people, including the Stand Up for Heroes fundraisers Hirsch and Andrew Fox, her partner in life and the comedy festival, to benefit the Bob Woodward Foundation.

More recently Hirsch asked Gissler to rethink some of the living spaces. After closing her namesake club in 2022, Hirsch and Fox found themselves spending more and more time at the beach, and, like so many people, they were working from home more often. They realized that the ground-floor guest bedroom and a small room that led to the pool were underutilized. “I always wanted more living space on the first floor,” says Hirsch.

Hirsch and Fox wanted more work space and room to entertain, but they also wanted an everyday place where they could screen movies and hang out. Working with his long-time senior designer, Craig Strulovitz, Gissler rethought these two rooms as a home office/sitting room and a new lounge and bar. “Caroline wanted something that was fresher, a little but more contemporary feeling” says Gissler of the direction of the redesign, which features much more color than before.

As they began making updates, those changes begat more changes (as home makeovers are a wont do to), resulting in a significant refresh of most of the home’s rooms. Some traditional leaning elements have been swapped out for more streamlined ones (notably: rugs). However, many pieces from the original decor remain. “You don’t need to change everything to make a change,” says Gissler. For example, the dining room’s Arts & Crafts-style chairs remain, but look fresh with new upholstery on the seats and set against a water-y blue wall color.

To make the former guest bedroom and pool room feel more in keeping with the rest of the public-facing rooms, Gissler and Strulovitz added millworker, beams, and bead-board. “A lot of the new houses are under-detailed,” confides Gissler. “Things like paneling and beams—whether they’re modern or traditional bring character to a space.” Several art acquisitions, including mid-20th century works by Larry Poons, Alfred Leslie, Yvonne Thomas, Theodoros Stamos, and William Baziotes were also added.

Those layers of art and architectural character are also what makes the house fell relevant decades after it’s first design. “People toss around the work “timeless” so much that it’s become meaningless,” says Gissler. “But there’s a responsibility to make good choices not just bases on trends, but on the house. You have to listen to what the house says and what the owner say—and find a bridge between the two.”

Hirsch says she couldn’t be more pleased with he refresh, noting that the lounge now gets used more that almost any other room. “It’s thrilling to still have a relationship—both with the client and with the house—and be able to make changes as I’ve changed, as she’s changed, and as the world has changed,” says Gissler.