Quiet Town x Block

Lisa and Michael Fine are the creative minds behind Quiet Town. Though they built their brand on bath accessories and textiles, their collaboration with Block represents the first time they’ve designed a bathroom to be available to the public. We caught up with Lisa to chat about the process, her design philosophy, and all things Quiet Town.

How did Quiet Town start?

“We started Quiet Town 5 years ago. I was working at Madewell as the Director of Styling, where I’d helped build it up from when it was a tiny little company, and Michael, my husband, was a photographer mainly shooting fashion. Then, I had my first child, and he basically didn’t sleep for the first two and a half years. So there I would be, in his room in the dark, trying to get him to go to bed, and for some reason, my mind would go to designing shower curtains. It was like a meditative process.

I think my Virgo self really loved the idea of focusing on this underdog space, and I just couldn’t shake this idea that there wasn’t anything that interesting in the bathroom. Home design and interiors seemed to have so many beautiful things for kitchens and the bedroom and living rooms, but the bathroom felt neglected."

How do you design for Quiet Town?

“We would never design something that’s not functional, that’s not necessary, that doesn’t get used a lot. Ephemeral beautiful things are incredibly necessary in the world, but not something we’re super interested in for Quiet Town. Instead, we want to make things that’ll get used a lot, and loved and washed and worn and will last a long time. We want to make things that are hardworking.

What I liked in particular about designing for shower curtains was that it’s such a humble item— which is probably why a lot of brands don’t dedicate that much care to it. But that’s why I love it. The idea is that every detail in your home should be thoughtfully made."

What we hope to bring to the bathroom with Block is an easy, cool, accessible sensibility.

What was it like designing your bathroom for Block?

"What we hope to bring to the bathroom with Block is an easy, cool, accessible sensibility. As a stylist, I learned that a pair of sweatpants or a simple pair of Dickies can be elevated if you thoughtfully build around it. You can create something beautiful with simplicity, and that’s what we’re striving to do with this space. It’s taking a really unique but really focused concept like grids and tile, and maximizing it so that you can create a thoughtful and elevated experience.

We recently renovated ourselves, and walking into a world like that is daunting because it’s expensive, and only something you ever do a couple of times, so there’s a lot of unknowns. We liked the idea of making an accessible way into that world while still having a really unique conceptual spin on things."

How did you approach the design process?

"We wanted to make a design system, rather than a specific design, because we didn’t want to say you have to have it this way, or that way. But there are things that we honed in on. For Quiet Town, we’re always thinking about the natural world and the man-made world when we think of things like patterns, color, texture, and we brought that to Block as well. I love the warmth that the look of wood can bring to this space, so making that a moment was something important for us. Same goes for the expressive use of color, and the dramatic niche that we crafted our space around."