The intense color hits you as soon as you walk in the door of the small atelier and shop nestled on a quiet street in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood. Red dominates, followed by neutrals and a generous splash of black. Summing up the energetic chaos of Branca, the creative design group she founded in the early ’80s, Alessandra Branca notes, “This is not a showcase for my decorating. It is a place from which we draw to create the work we do.”

There is the definite mark of Alessandra in this cozy suite of rooms just a block from her home. Her signature red—a color befitting the Roman expatriate who exudes the gusto of an artfully lived life—punches up every room. The intense color hits you as soon as you walk in the door of the small atelier and shop nestled on a quiet street in Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood. Red dominates, followed by neutrals and a generous splash of black. Summing up the energetic chaos of Branca, the creative design group she founded in the early ’80s, Alessandra Branca notes, “This is not a showcase for my decorating. It is a place from which we draw to create the work we do.”

Text by Jennifer Wilson
Photographs by John Bessler
Produced by Jenny Bradley