“When I was a little girl, I was always rearranging my mother’s furniture,” recalls Priscilla Presley. “She would leave for a little while and come back to find the whole house had been changed.” Those early exercises in feng shui proved only the beginning for the actress and entrepreneur who decorated or helped decorate virtually every home she’s since occupied (with the exception of late-husband Elvis Presley’s Graceland estate).
But Presley wasn’t content to stop there. “For a while now, I’ve really wanted my own home furnishings collection,” she says. And last year she found a suitable “partner in crime” in HStudio founder and owner Shlomi Haziza. “He thinks differently,” she says of the Israeli-born furniture designer. “He’s the first person whom I’ve worked with who truly gets me and what I’m about creatively.”
Together the pair created Priscilla Presley Home, a 100-plus-piece collection of home décor and furniture designs launching this summer. “It’s affordable luxury,” says Presley of the moderately priced, high-quality line that runs the gamut from sofas, rugs, and lamps to chairs, picture frames, candlesticks, and more.
Not one to relegate herself to a single signature look, Presley devised three mini collections: Traditional Living, which takes its cues from Presley’s years in the South; Gothic Modern, a blend of rock ’n’ roll swagger and slick silhouettes; and Vintage Eclectic, featuring tufted-velvet love seats and an aubergine-inspired color palette. Presley and Haziza designed the ménage à trois of styles to be playfully interwoven. “That’s what we’d prefer to see,” says Presley. “It’s supposed to feel eclectic.”
Unlike many celebrities whose involvement with their namesake product consists of posing with it on the red carpet, Presley has, by all accounts, been deeply committed to her line every step of the way—sampling fabric swatches, reviewing sketches, and even helping determine proportions. “And if she didn’t like something, she’d say it,” says Haziza.
As a result, Presley’s imprint can be found throughout the collection, from compartmentalized vanity drawers (“so it’s easier to organize your lipsticks and makeup”) to vinyl upholstery (“It’s so practical and easy to clean.”). The dedicated animal-rights activist also devised animal motifs for each category: horses for Traditional Living, doves for Gothic Modern, and butterflies for Vintage Eclectic.
Yet when it comes to such creative impulses, Presley is eager to share the credit. “I think being married to the person I was with, I learned it’s okay to think outside the box,” she says. “There will be some people who love it and some people who don’t, but it’s better to have that than to play it safe.”
