We had the good fortune of connecting with Janet T Marena and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Janet T, have there been any changes in how you think about work-life balance?
Work/life balance calls to us now more than ever. As my husband declared during COVID, it is not work from home, but instead live at work.

As an interior designer, I continue to have conversations around this issue with my clients, many of whom previously worked outside the home, but who are now spending the vast majority of time in their houses. In California, evaluating interior and exterior spaces has become a primary focus for many clients as they seek to transform their homes to truly reflect the needs in their lives now and in the future.

As I work with my clients to define interior and exterior spaces in their homes, I encourage them to explore the grounding force that nature has on our mental processes. As we strive for personal balance between work and life we look for ways to enhance our inner spaces with the natural world as support in this endeavor.

Biophilic design, while not a new concept, may be an unfamiliar one. Essentially it is the use of direct and indirect references to nature to effect a sense of connectivity to the natural environment among the occupants of an interior space. In other words, “bringing the outside in”.

This Work/Life balance challenge is present in my own life as well. If you are like me it can be truly difficult to shut off ‘work brain’ no matter where you are. For me, I never know when creativity and innovation may pop up. Many of my best ideas arrive when I’m not at work, but rather enjoying a natural environment.

My efforts to improve the balance in my own life has had a positive impact in my work with clients as I seek to offer design ideas to support the many challenges they may face. Allowing conversations to happen without electronic media and often in the presence of nature helps us remember we are all connected to the world outside and ultimately, to each other.

As Freud said, we need both work and play in order to thrive. It makes sense that these benefit from the marriage of interior and exterior spaces. I love my work and bringing these concepts into the homes I create with my clients. We all need spaces in which to interact with colleagues, family, friends and perhaps most importantly, with ourselves.

Hopefully we will get back to a sense of more ‘normal’ existence soon. Even then, we should all strive to have both our interior and exterior spaces support the many facets or our lives. After all work/life balance is a key component to life-long happiness.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
At JTM Interiors, we collaborate, communicate, listen and design your forever home. 

As a young girl, I taught myself to draw and paint. In school, I excelled in biology so when it came time to go to college I attended a school with that major. It never occurred to me, nor was I encouraged to, go to school for art.

In my twenties I held various positions as an administrative assistant, until I choose to see a career counselor. My tests indicated creative careers and those included advertising or public relations, PR. I chose PR as I could be both creative and the account person interacting with clients. Being a part of this process from the beginning to the end thrilled me.

I started as an assistant and worked my way to a vice president. My greatest accomplishment was working on Proctor & Gamble’s test market for their first environmentally responsible product packaging. Upon a successful test market, I worked to create a national campaign while working at one of the world’s largest PR firms. At the time I worked out of the Boston office, while the headquarters were in NY. NY and Boston are rivals, and I was challenged the whole time to do what NY wanted – not what I intuitively felt was right. Ultimately, we did implement my campaign idea and it won huge accolades for the client and agency.

After my husband and I bought our first house, we remodeled it ourselves and that compelled me to study art and interior design at The New England School of Art and Design, Suffolk University.

My real-life interior design experience accumulated under the tutelage of the notable Gerald Pomeroy Interiors. We worked together on everything from billing, production, design and also four Junior League of Boston Showhouses. In this role, it was exciting to see and learn the design process from beginning to end. After several years, I decided to strike out on my own and started JTM Interiors.

Now in my own business, I work with our clients from the beginning with the architect all the way through to the end with the general contractor. I love the whole process because we can ensure that our collective vision becomes a reality for my clients and their homes.

As I learned while working in PR, I listen to my intuition, and I speak from both my mind and heart. I’ve also continued to love collaborating with people on all of our projects, often seeing the whole become greater than the sum of the parts.

While peer and public recognition are wonderful, I’ve earned ‘awards’ by doing my work. For example, I’ve won Houzz design awards in 6 different years. One of my images, taken in 2012 has been downloaded by more than 100,000 people and it continues to be downloaded. A testament to producing beautiful and timeless spaces for our clients.

I’ve also intuitively and now with more structure and discipline, incorporated biophilic design in all of our work. We use both direct and indirect references to nature to help us remember we are all connected to the world.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Of course my itinerary would be customized for the type of friend that is visiting, but here are some enjoyable spots I’d venture out to for a weekend. We would start out driving down the coast from the bay area to Big Sur, ensuring we arrive before noon to have lunch at Napenthe. The view of the forest and ocean is a great way to connect with the beauty of the California coast. From there we would head up the coast to Carmel. I love strolling along Ocean Ave, visiting the shops, people watching and admiring the natural landscape of the ocean. Enjoy dinner and the night at a local inn. The next day I’d head north up the coast and arrive at Capitola. A must stop would be Gayle’s Bakery along with several antique stores around Capitola and Santa Cruz. From there we would head over the mountain on Route 17 back to the bay area but not before stopping off at a few wineries on the way. For dinner we would stop in Los Gatos before we head back to the bay.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I shout out to Mary Welty Dapkus of Fresh Intuition as she has been my business, life and spiritual coach since moving to San Jose in 2014. I would not be where I am today without her and her incredible guidance and spirit.

Website: jtminteriors.com

Instagram: @jtminteriors

Linkedin: Janet T. Marena

Facebook: jtminteriors

Image Credits
David Duncan Livingston Photography Michael J. Lee Photography

Nominate Someone: ShoutoutLA is built on recommendations and shoutouts from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.