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"Gallerists who swear that bold art is best displayed against stark white walls might blanch when confronted with a Manhattan apartment in which paintings and photographs rest against candy-color backgrounds. Actually, the works in question\u2014a thoughtful collection ranging from an emotionally charged Kara Walker cut-paper silhouette of a church being set ablaze to a hypnotic Andrew Moore photograph of Rotari&amp;#039;s Gallery at Peterhof\u2014do not so much hang as they pop here and meld there. Charming or edgy, the art engages with the decor rather than keeping a reverent distance. A Donald Baechler collage practically leaps off a pale-aqua wall in the kitchen, for example. And the lilac-painted living room is the site of a dreamlike Kiki Smith colored etching\u2014the heroine of Alice&amp;#039;s Adventures in Wonderland sitting on a hill beneath a cloudless sky\u2014whose complementary pastels cause it to blend into the wall behind. &amp;quot;It&amp;#039;s like looking through a window,&amp;quot; says the lady of the house, an effervescent collector who lives in the apartment&amp;#039;s tart, funky rooms with her financier husband and three daughters.  Though the couple had long favored the neutral colors that are often deemed more art-friendly, decorator Katie Ridder helped them take a walk on the wild side, chromatically speaking. &amp;quot;The colors don&amp;#039;t compete with the art, they promote it,&amp;quot; says the wife, adding that they couldn&amp;#039;t have done it without getting outside help. &amp;quot;We wanted to go somewhere we could not go on our own. Luckily, Katie was able to be that guide for us.&amp;quot; Fans of Ridder know that sprightly mixes of mouthwatering hues are her specialty. In the early 1990s, the shelter-magazine editor turned decorator had a sassy little shop on Lexington Avenue stocked with intriguing Turkish textiles whose smoky darks and jewely brights profoundly influenced Ridder&amp;#039;s aesthetic. The now-defunct boutique&amp;#039;s Ottoman pizzazz left a lasting impression on visitors too, her latest client included. As the wife explains, &amp;quot;I never bought anything there, but I remember everything about it.&amp;quot; More than a decade later, she sought out Ridder to redecorate her home. But before the designer could get down to work, the floor plan required a thorough revise to seamlessly combine the family&amp;#039;s existing apartment and a slightly smaller one they had purchased next door. The architect tapped for the job was Ridder&amp;#039;s favorite collaborator\u2014her husband, the classicist Peter Pennoyer. He and partner Elizabeth Graziolo developed a refined scheme that was inspired by great apartment-house interiors of the 1920s. &amp;quot;One half of it was gutted almost entirely,&amp;quot; Ridder says of the renovation, noting that the goal was for the ninth-floor residence to &amp;quot;feel like a house.&amp;quot; A long entrance hall, or gallery, serves as the main artery, separating the public rooms overlooking Central Park from the private ones on the east side of the building. (&amp;quot;My husband wanted some distance from four women,&amp;quot; the homeowner wryly observes.) Skimpy period moldings\u2014Pennoyer describes the 1925 structure as a &amp;quot;developer building constructed by the hundreds&amp;quot; back then\u2014were replaced by fine cornices and baseboards whose lean, understated profiles have a faintly Art Deco panache.  One delightful touch is an octagonal hall that transforms an otherwise awkward spot in the floor plan into a spatial treat; more practically, it connects the gallery, kitchen, and dining room and can be used for dinner-party overflow. &amp;quot;We wanted to create a shape that reaches out,&amp;quot; says Pennoyer of the space, home to a blue-horsehair-clad settee once owned by the Duke and Duchess of Windsor and a punchy red-and-white abstract oil painting by Caio Fonseca. That liveliness never lets up. Rose-pink upholstery and an aquamarine Murano-glass chandelier seem to glow in the chocolate-brown dining room, where a floor-to-ceiling bookcase, a comfortable sofa, and heirloom Louis XV\u2013style armchairs encourage reading between meals. &amp;quot;We didn&amp;#039;t want any of the rooms to be dead zones,&amp;quot; Ridder says. Even the private elevator vestibule, a spot often given short shrift, is energized. A moody hand-painted floral pattern enriches the walls, and a sculptural cast-brass peephole that is a reproduction of a 1902 design by the Catalan Art Nouveau master Antoni Gaud\u00ED is mounted on the faux-mahogany front door. Just as small but spirited is the study paneled with purple leather. One daughter&amp;#039;s bathroom got a helping of bright-blue Moroccan tiles, while two others are sheathed in whimsical wallpapers Ridder found on a Finnish website. The powder room off the bold-blue pantry is surprisingly peppy as well, its paper printed with tall spindly trees that seem straight out of a children&amp;#039;s book by Maurice Sendak. Fine art needs white walls? &amp;quot;No way,&amp;quot; says the collector, clearly a convert to color\u2014though she avers that it took a few days for her and her husband to feel entirely at ease in their brilliant new digs. &amp;quot;Now we&amp;#039;re all about embellishing!&amp;quot; "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elledecor.com/design-decorate/interior-designers/tips/a3799/step-lively-a-46754/>