Poker pro gets a hand from friends in decorating his new Hermosa Beach apartment
Professional poker player Joe Sebok, host of “Poker2Nite” on Fox Sports, and designer Kristan Cunningham of “Design on a Dime” fame have teamed up to outfit his new apartment on the Strand in Hermosa Beach.
Sebok recently signed a year lease on the two-bedroom, one-bathroom ocean-view unit at $3,150 a month. For the card player, who spends much of his time traveling and staying in hotels, it’s his first place of his own.
But in typical Sebok social networking fashion, this is no ordinary client-decorator working relationship.
“The coolest part is we basically decided to do the whole thing on Twitter and Facebook,” said Sebok, who has a large following on Twitter.
Both Sebok and Cunningham have online audiences, so they use social media as a communication and decision-making tool and as a way to allow others to track their back and forth. “It just made sense instead of having meetings,” Cunningham said.
She will take videos of thrift store and flea market finds, for example, and put them online for Sebok and Facebook fans to see and comment on. Or she’ll compile a collage of potential items for one of his rooms. The pair also go over costs online to show people how a look could be accomplished differently. Commentary from “not very design-savvy” people vetoing a selection, however, has been trying at times, Cunningham said.
Sebok found the rental after launching what he called a “three-pronged beach attack” looking in Redondo Beach, Hermosa Beach and Manhattan Beach. “Manhattan was a little too adult for me, Redondo a little too young,” said Sebok, 32. “This hits the sweet spot.”
The second-story apartment, right on the sand, fits with his lifestyle when he’s in town. “I run every day and surf.”
With tournaments, a TV show and a website, his primary residence needs to double as the nerve center for his different businesses and a place to entertain friends. He envisions an environment that’s “young, casual, hip — a cross between modern and a beach residence.”
With no previous decorating experience, Sebok turned to Cunningham, whom he met through an acquaintance.
“What I do best is help people figure out how to do things on a budget,” said Cunningham, who has 15 years’ experience as a designer. “He started with nothing but a mattress. We’ll stay under $15,000 with sheets, art and accessories.”
To keep costs down, many of the furnishings are being purchased from big-box stores. “Everything we buy can’t be the ultimate lifetime piece, although there are some quality pieces that can go along with him to other places,” Cunningham said.
One of the challenges of designing the space has been working within 750 square feet.
“Both bedrooms are barely big enough to hold a bed,” Cunningham said. “We decided to take his bedroom and make it about the bed, just a bedroom. The second bedroom is going to be a men’s dressing room/closet with a large bench that could also be a guest bed.”
She thought it would give the unit a more luxurious feel to devote the square footage to something so indulgent. “The space only needs to work for him.”
But the center of attention is the living room, which has windows along the beach side. “This apartment is purely about the view,” Cunningham said. “That’s why he chose it.”
Cunningham managed to put 30 feet of sectional sofas in the 19-foot wide room to provide space for friends to come over and lounge. To create floor-to-ceiling window treatments that cut the heat from the sun when needed, she bought 108 feet of drop cloths online. They will be hemmed to make draperies. The fabric is the same color as the walls and will look “masculine, utilitarian, classic,” she said. “The effect is going to be stellar for something so inexpensive.”
Sebok was ranked as the 17th most influential person in poker last year by Bluff magazine with tournament winnings in excess of $1.8 million. He is president of PokerRoad.com.
Cunningham became the host of HGTV’s “Design on a Dime” in 2003 and keeps a running commentary of her interaction with Sebok on Facebook.
