When Ashley Miles isn’t hustling deals as Refinery29’s EVP of Brand Partnerships, it’s pretty much guaranteed that you’ll find her in one of two places: at her bonkers-amazing West Village carriage house (which was the former photo gallery and home of Diane Arbus), or in some dusty corner in an antiques shop, hunting for vintage treasures. “I have been an antique and vintage collector my whole life," she says. "Call me crazy, but I have storage units all over Manhattan and New Orleans filled with my collections.” But after one particularly fruitful trip to an estate sale, Miles realized that she had just plain run out of room.
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Style is about celebrating your own personal identity throughout all aspects of your life.
Ashley Miles
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“I slowed down and became super bummed out,” Miles confessed. “But, I was looking at my white brick walls and started imagining my objects on the wall.” She took some of her more beloved pieces, housed them in lucite storage boxes, cleverly paired them with coordinating fabrics that she hand-crafted to complement each object, and filled her home with them. Soon, Miles' guests began asking for their own. “There began I Am Ashley Miles!” she laughs.
Miles’ singular sense of style even extends to how she categorizes and names her objects d’art. A collection of metal graters she found in 10 different cities sits atop a heart-tiled scarf and is titled “The Gratest Love.” Miles describes the piece as representative of her love of travel (and puns, apparently).
“Style is about celebrating your own personal identity throughout all aspects of your life — your wardrobe, your home decor, your art, even how you eat and shop,” Miles states. “It was important for me to tell the stories about people and society that I saw behind these objects.”