A millennial transformed a house into her pink '90s dream home with a movie theater and arcade. Now she has to sell.
Alcynna Lloyd
- Kate Gabrielle spent $20,000 transforming a basic New Jersey home into a one-of-a-kind playhouse.
- The uniquely designed home has a private 90s-themed cinema and a replica of her childhood bedroom.
Kate Gabrielle has a favorite color.
She's painted her front door and shutters pink, and placed pink flamingo figurines on either side of the path that leads to it. Her plush sectional couch is upholstered in pink velvety fabric. The kitchen cabinets and countertops? They're shades of rose.
You get the idea.
The 37-year-old illustrator goes by Kate Gabrielle on Instagram and TikTok, where she has amassed more than 251,000 total followers who track her colorful posts about the pins, keychains, stickers, purse charms, and accessories she hand-makes, as well as her interior-design and DIY projects.
She asked to be referred to by her social-media name for privacy reasons, but Business Insider has verified her identity.
In 2022, Gabrielle spent $340,000 on a 1,778-square-foot ranch-style house in Hamilton, New Jersey, a township about six miles east of Trenton, the state capital.
Since then, she's poured her heart, soul, and about $20,000 into transforming the property on Hughes Drive into an oasis of youthful nostalgia.
The result is a dazzling cornucopia of pink hues, each room bursting with retro art and memorabilia that pay homage to the iconic movies, toys, and culture of the 1960s and 1990s.
"The comment I get the most, which is exactly what I hoped for, is that people feel happy when they walk in," Gabrielle told BI. "My friends' kids love it; it's like a big playhouse."
It's also where she creates the inventory for her accessory-design company, also called Kate Gabrielle, which has a flagship product: purses with cup holders that keep water bottles or reusable coffee cups upright.
But when another supplier started selling a suspiciously similar version of her cup-holder purses on Amazon, Gabrielle started struggling financially.
"The knockoff went viral on TikTok, which has really hurt my sales," Gabrielle said. "I've been trying for months to figure out how I could keep the house, but it just wasn't adding up."
She reluctantly listed the home for sale for $500,000 in July.
A buyer could choose to pay extra for the furnishings Gabrielle lovingly made and picked out. Either way, Gabrielle hopes the next owner will share her love for this one-of-a-kind home and preserve its distinct character.
"A lot of people will say, 'I wish I could live somewhere like this, but my husband would never let me,'" Gabrielle said. "I also get comments like, 'How on earth can you live here? It would drive me crazy.' But I just think, 'To each their own.'"
Take a look around Gabrielle's dream home.
The home has three bedrooms, one and a half bathrooms, and a two-car garage.
Gabrielle focused primarily on aesthetic updates to the home, with minimal exterior or structural renovations.
"The work was pretty much just interior design," she said. "I did hire a contractor to screen the front porch, but everything else was mostly cosmetic changes. I didn't tear down any walls."
Pink might be an unusual color for a front door, but it made the most sense to Gabrielle.
"Every time I attempt to go for a straight retro look with interior design, the kitsch just comes out, and before I know it, everything turns pink," she said. "I just can't help myself."
The home's walls are filled with art from floor to ceiling.
"From a very early age, I enjoyed making my space exactly how I wanted it," Gabrielle said. "I was always encouraged to be as weird and quirky as I wanted to be, and that didn't change as I got older."
Decorating the home was a labor of love for Gabrielle.
She personally painted the kitchen cabinets, fridge, and countertops, choosing to refresh the ones that came with the house rather than replace them.
"Basically every free minute I had — when I wasn't working or sleeping — I worked on the home, from the day I got the keys until the day I decided to sell it," she said. "I couldn't begin to even add up the hours."
Every item in the home has been carefully and thoughtfully selected.
In her quest to source the perfect furnishings for her home, Gabrielle left no stone unturned.
"A lot of my decorations came from eBay and the furniture is a combination of IKEA, Wayfair, and Facebook Marketplace," she said.
The primary bedroom looks like something from a Polly Pocket or Barbie playhouse.
While many of the home's rooms might seem inspired by those iconic toy franchises, Gabrielle said her influence came from somewhere else entirely.
"I was heavily influenced by "Clarissa Explains It All," she said. "It was a Nickelodeon show in the '90s with Melissa Joan Hart, and her room was just the coolest ever."
Instead of using wallpaper, Gabrielle hand-cut each of the flowers for her bathroom's walls.
"I used the Cricut to cut out flowers for the bathroom and applied them," she said. "I did my best to make upgrades to the home as budget-friendly as possible."
Gabrielle refers to this as her "time-travel room" because it's a replica of her childhood bedroom.
"The layout isn't exactly the same, and I wasn't able to find the original curtains," she said. "But this is as close as I could possibly get. When I walk into it, it feels like I've time-traveled."
The home cinema is Gabrielle’s favorite room.
Gabrielle and her brother built the arched entryway for the room, which has six recliner seats.
"Having a home theater was always a dream for me," she said. "As soon as I saw the room when I toured the house, I envisioned everything in my head. I loved the idea of having an arched entryway and a really fun '90s movie theater carpet."
The cinema's posters were collected over the years.
"Every one of my favorite movies is represented there," Gabrielle said. "I have "Sunday in New York," "The Trouble with Angels," "How to Steal a Million," and "Modesty Blaise."
The home even has its own arcade.
The game room is a time capsule of beloved classics, including Pac-Man, Asteroids, and classic table hockey.
The home has already attracted a lot of interest in the short time it's been on the market, she said.
Although the house hasn't sold yet, Gabrielle is working on making it look more appealing in hopes of a quick sale. She also plans to move into an apartment by August.
"I don't think I've fully wrapped my head around this yet," she said. "I think once I have to take all of my stuff down, it's going to be really hard."
Despite the bittersweet farewell, Gabrielle plans to create a similar atmosphere in her new apartment.
"I'm probably going to recreate my living room and the time-travel room, but for the other rooms, I think I'll be starting from scratch," she said. "I'm hoping that if I can get it close enough, I'll still feel like I'm at home."
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