A startup design firm in Portland expects to grow during 2020, partly as a result of business with one of the city’s newly planned hotels.
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“Everything we do has a story to it,” Jacqueline McGee says of Ealain Studio, an interior design firm she launched in Portland with business partner Janet d’Aprix last summer.
This year will include work on Ealain’s first project in Portland, a Canopy by Hilton hotel being developed by Jim Brady. The hotel, which will be on Commercial Street, will feature an indoor-outdoor rooftop bar around the theme of a beacon on the water and 135 guest rooms with a residential feel.
McGee, who is British by birth and was an art director for BBC Television productions, segued into interior design in 2003, while d’Aprix has been working in design since 1997. They were both previously with the Boston office of Perkins and Will, a global architecture firm, before parlaying their award-winning national portfolio into a firm of their own in Portland.
“We’re new in Maine but we’re not a new business,” McGee says. She leads design at Ealain while d’Aprix is studio director. The company name, (pronounced “ay-LAHN”) comes from Elada, a Gaelic word for art, science, acquired craft or skill — appropriate for a firm focused on lifestyle boutique and high-end hotels. Recent projects include Boston’s Whitney Hotel.
Canopy by Hilton, the first of three projects for Ealain in Portland, is being developed by Jim Brady’s Fathom Cos. and is set to open in 2021. Brady, a 2017 Mainebiz Next honoree who developed Portland’s Press Hotel, enlisted Ealain for his latest project in Maine’s largest city after being impressed with its portfolio of creative hotel design work.
“I saw working with them as a great way to stay local, while they also brought a much broader national perspective and work experience,” Brady says.
The interior design work includes all rooms, public spaces and an indoor-outdoor rooftop bar, and McGee says that this spring they’ll build a model guest room at an off-site warehouse.
At Elain’s office on Fore St. where they currently employ eight designers, McGee says she’s optimistic about growth in 2020 and beyond, with plans to add more interns from Maine who study out of state.
“There’s no accredited interior design program in the whole of Maine, and that’s a big problem,” she says. “By coming here and attracting young talent to Maine, we’re offering something very different in the interior design business.”
She also hopes to be up to 20 employees in two years from now, noting, “There’s plenty of space next door. We really love this office.”
