Elin Kelsey, Principal Interior Architect, ASID
Elin trained in interior architecture at the University of Oregon, where the programme's emphasis on daylight and section drawing set the habits the studio still works by. Before founding the practice in 2016, Elin spent seven years in Portland and Seattle practices detailing millwork for residential and small cultural projects, and two years in a Copenhagen studio where the 3 mm reveal and the lime-plaster wall became permanent fixtures of the vocabulary.
Elin is a professional member of the American Society of Interior Designers and lectures occasionally on residential acoustics and circadian lighting to architecture students and to the Portland chapter. Elin lives in Northwest Portland, a ten-minute walk from the studio, in a house that has served as the test bed for most of what appears on this site.
How the studio works
- Listen and measure. We visit, we talk about how you live, and we take light-level and reverberation readings in the rooms that matter. A written brief follows within two weeks.
- Section first. Daylight is drawn in section before plans are fixed. Glazing head heights, sky angles and reflectances are set here.
- Material board. Physical samples of oak, plaster, felt and stone are assembled and reviewed under the actual light of the room where possible.
- Millwork package. Full shop-drawing-level documentation of every built-in, with reveals, hardware and finish schedules. We review the fabricator's drawings against ours.
- Lighting package. Fixture schedule, control intent and a circadian timetable, coordinated with the electrical engineer.
- Site and handover. We are present at veneer layup, first fix and final adjustment. Before handover we log illuminance and RT60 in each primary room and hand you a one-page guide to the house.
The company
- Elin KelseyPrincipal Interior Architect · ASID · founder
- Tomas Reyes-LindqvistProject Architect · daylight modelling · construction documents
- Priya AnandMillwork Detailer · shop drawing review · fabricator liaison
- CollaboratorsLicensed architect and structural engineer of record, acoustic consultant and lighting engineer, engaged per project
Working with us
We work across Portland, the Columbia River Gorge and the Willamette Valley, and occasionally further afield for the right house. Fees are proposed as a fixed sum per phase after the initial visit. Write to studio@elinkelseyandcompany.com, or to Elin directly at elin@elinkelseyandcompany.com. Please include the address, the rooms that matter most, and a sentence about how you want the house to sound.
Our practice areas are described in detail under Custom Architectural Millwork and Circadian Daylight & Biophilic Interiors, and recent houses are documented in Selected Works.