nelson.skinner

About

About us

 

nelson.skinner is a design firm that focuses on custom home design:

interiors, renovations, new-builds and landscaping.

We have helped to provide many families with living spaces that bring them well-being, joy and comfort. We believe in the advantages created by designing carefully considered homes, customized to the needs of the client, while also placing value on quality and sustainability.

As a team, we share some very important common goals:

  • Listen first. Understanding our clients mandate, both the lofty desires and real-life restrictions, is critical to enable project-specific design.

  • Provide a streamlined and transparent process of design that includes input and participation from our clients.

  • Observe and implement all the applicable bylaws, building codes and latest construction practices, including the BC Energy Step Code to ensure high standards of efficient design.

  • Create simple, beautiful and highly-functional living spaces.

With a combined 40 years in the design and construction industry, we have been involved in various scales of projects that spread across the lower mainland, the sunshine coast and Whistler.

 

Jenny Nelson (BA, B.I.D.)

Jenny developed her love of beautiful design as a child in her grandmother’s Shaughnessy neighbourhood garden. Nature, being forever the inspiration.

Jenny worked as a florist at the prestigious Thomas Hobbs Company while pursuing her undergraduate degree at the University of British Columbia, ultimately leading to a Bachelor of Interior Design from Kwantlen Polytechnic University. After gaining valuable experience while working at two local residential design firms in North Vancouver, and now as a new Mum, Jenny then joined the family business, NelsonDesign. In 2012, Jenny became sole proprietor and, since 2019, has been collaborating with Kelli Skinner of S2studio.

Recognizing the benefits of combining their skills, Jenny and Kelli joined forces to establish nelson.skinner - a practical approach to timeless, beautiful and environmentally aware residential design. With 20 years of design and Client care, Jenny plays an important role of project manager along with her principal design role.

If Jenny isn’t working in her home office, or now in her own garden, you’ll find her on a basketball court or skiing and chasing her boys down the mountains of B.C.

Kelli N. Skinner (BA, BEDs, MArch)

As a 12 year old girl on her first family trip to Europe, Kelli marvelled at cities and communities that seemed much more beautiful than her hometown of Edmonton A.B., so it was then that she decided on a career in Architecture. Her Bachelors Degree at the University of Victoria focused on Greek and Roman studies, but then Kelli started exploring the world more broadly, travelling further into Europe but also to Asia, Central America and the USA. She lived and worked in diverse cities, such as Düsseldorf, Chicago and Tainan (Taiwan) before earning her Masters of Architecture at Dalhousie University in Halifax, N.S. in 2005.

Over the years, Kelli added to her architectural education through work experience as an intern architect in several firms, but also through hands-on construction work on residential projects. In 2008, Kelli and her partner established S2studio as a flexible, client-oriented design firm that allowed Kelli to keep doing rewarding work while also growing her family.

Kelli finally settled in North Vancouver, B.C., where she eventually met and started collaborating with Jenny of NelsonDesign. With shared design principles and business priorities, it was a natural progression for Jenny and Kelli to create nelson.skinner as a joint practice of residential design and interiors.