Welcome to Murphy Lane Interiors!

Hi, I’m Makenzie, the designer behind Murphy Lane Interiors. And while this business is new, sharing pieces of my life online isn’t.

I started creating content years and years ago when I was in high school, back when what I had to share was mostly makeup and beauty. I loved the process of planning and creating content, building community, and finding a shared space for the things I loved. As my life changed, so did the things I wanted to talk about. Eventually, I bought a house and started sharing DIY projects and renovations. Later, I shared parts of my journey to starting a family.

There have been a lot of versions of me on the internet over the years. And there have also been a lot of times when I disappeared.

I would come back excited to create again, fall into the rhythm of posting and sharing constantly, and eventually find myself overwhelmed by the expectation of having to be so on all the time. Content would slowly become forced and inauthentic, or I’d feel the need to overextend myself just to have enough exciting moments worth sharing. Every. Single. Day.

The last time I stepped away, I knew it was time to really evaluate what I wanted from my life. I had recently lost my job and, at the same time, was becoming a mother. Talk about a storm of transformative life events.

But ultimately, I realized I was finally ready to take interior design seriously. I wanted to turn a passion I’d had for years into something real. After all, how could I encourage my son to chase his wildest dreams if I was too afraid to chase mine?

So into my cocoon I went.

And I studied. And had a baby. And worked with design mentors. And learned how to survive on zero sleep. And built a business. And learned what it truly means to throw away the expectations of who you think you’re supposed to be and live authentically as yourself.

And now here I am, coming out of the cocoon, ready to begin sharing again. But this time, in a way and at a pace that feels honest and authentic to me, not to the TikTok or Meta algorithms.

Truthfully, I think our homes could use a little less pressure, too.

The more I’ve thought about how I want to show up online, the more I’ve realized how closely it mirrors what I believe about design.

We have access to more information and inspiration than ever before. There’s always another beautiful room to save, another product to buy, another trend arriving before we’ve even had the chance to attain the last.

And I love inspiration. I love looking at beautiful things (that is my job, after all!). I certainly don’t think we need to stop looking at other people’s homes or paying attention to what’s happening in design.

But I do wonder what this pace is doing to the way we design, decorate, and ultimately feel about our own homes.

Homes are meant to be lived in for years. Interior design is a major investment, not to mention the time it takes to build or renovate. Yet we’re consuming design at a pace that can make a perfectly beautiful room suddenly feel dated simply because we’ve seen something newer a hundred times on Pinterest.

It becomes very easy to confuse what we see most often with what we actually like.

And that brings me back to the same question I’ve been asking myself about being online:

“What would I choose if no one else were watching?”

That question has become an important part of how I think about Murphy Lane Interiors.

To me, authentic living means being willing to throw out everything you think you’re supposed to want and getting curious about what you actually do.

• What do you gravitate toward when you're not thinking about whether it's trending?

• How does your family actually use your home?

• What makes you comfortable? What makes you happy? What reminds you of somewhere you’ve been or someone you love?

• What do you want to surround yourself with when the cameras are gone and no one else is going to see it?

Those answers are far more interesting to me than following a formula for what a beautiful home is supposed to look like.

And somewhere along the way, I realized there was a bit of irony in believing in this philosophy so strongly when it came to design while trying to build my own presence according to everyone else’s formula.

I would never tell a client that their home needs to look, function, or feel a certain way simply because everyone else is doing it. So why would I do that to myself?

I want to build Murphy Lane Interiors the same way I want to design homes: intentionally, personally, and with enough confidence to leave room for the things that don’t fit neatly into a mold.

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So, what comes next?

Murphy Lane Interiors grew out of a genuine love for design and a belief that our homes deserve to feel just as beautiful, welcoming, and intentional as the lives unfolding within them. That philosophy shapes the work I do with my clients, but it also shapes the kind of business I want to build around it.

I want this to be a place for thoughtful, authentic design. A place where inspiration is a starting point rather than a set of instructions, where beautiful things can be appreciated without feeling the need to chase every new trend, and where the way a home feels and functions matters just as much as how it photographs.

That same intention shapes what I want to share through Murphy Lane Interiors, too.

Social media will still be part of it. I love creating, teaching, sharing projects as they take shape, and connecting with people who care about design as much as I do. You’ll probably even see glimpses of the life happening behind the business, because the way we live has always been inseparable from the way I think about home.

But I also wanted a place where design could be explored beyond the pace of a social media feed. So I’m bringing back something that feels almost a little old school: a blog.

The Design Journal is where I’ll go deeper. It’s a growing library of practical design guidance, renovation advice, project stories, favorite finds, and thoughtful conversations about creating a home that feels distinctly like your own.

Some topics deserve more than a fifteen-second video or a caption before we move on to the next thing. I want to create resources worth saving, ideas worth considering, and information you can return to when you actually need it.

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Make Yourself At Home

Murphy Lane Interiors is the culmination of a lot of growth, learning, and figuring out what matters to me. And as it grows, I want one idea to remain at the center of everything I do: the best spaces aren’t created by following someone else’s formula. They come from understanding who you are, how you want to live, and creating a home that makes room for both.

That’s what designing spaces for authentic living means to me.

And I’m so excited to share more of it with you.