Elmhurst, Illinois
Dara Agruss Design is a full-service interior design studio based in Elmhurst, working on whole-home projects, gut renovations and new construction across DuPage County and Chicago's western suburbs.
We take on a small number of projects each year so they get our full attention: millwork drawn to the inch, fabrics chosen in person, and an install day when the whole house comes together. And because the studio is in town, a site visit takes ten minutes, not half a day.
Recent work · Elmhurst, IL
From full gut renovations of 1920s houses near Wilder Park to newly built homes in Cherry Farm. This is what our work looks like on Elmhurst streets.
What we do
Most of our Elmhurst clients come to us for the whole house, not a single room. Full-service means we carry the project from the first floor plan to the day the last lamp is placed:
You make the decisions that matter to you. We handle the several hundred that don't.
How we work
The same process for every Elmhurst project, whether it's one room or an entire new build.
A short conversation about your home, your timeline and the scope you have in mind. We tell you honestly whether we're the right studio for it.
We walk your Elmhurst home, measure, photograph and talk through how each room actually needs to work for the people in it.
Floor plans, elevations, renderings, finishes and a complete furniture plan, presented together, room by room, in one sitting.
We place every order, track every lead time, receive and inspect every piece, and coordinate directly with your builder and trades.
Everything arrives, gets placed and gets styled. You leave in the morning and come home to a finished house.
Elmhurst houses
Elmhurst has two kinds of houses and they ask for completely different things. Around Wilder Park, Crescent Park and Eldridge Park, the 1920s and 1930s Tudors, Colonials and Craftsman homes come with original millwork, plaster walls and rooms that were never meant to open into one another. We design around that character rather than stripping it out.
In Cherry Farm and north Elmhurst, teardown-and-rebuild has produced a generation of large new homes that arrive architecturally blank. Those need the opposite: warmth, texture and detail added deliberately, ideally chosen before the drywall goes up.
Full-service means we handle the entire project: space planning, custom millwork and cabinetry, furniture, upholstery, window treatments, finishes, lighting, art and accessories, plus ordering, receiving, delivery coordination and installation. You make the decisions that matter to you; we manage everything behind them.
We work through trade-only showrooms, workrooms and artisans that aren't open to the public, which is where most of the character in an Elmhurst project comes from. See everything included in our services →
Most of our Elmhurst work is whole-home. We take on full-house furnishing projects, gut renovations and new construction, and we deliberately keep the number of concurrent projects small so each one gets senior attention rather than being handed down.
Single-room projects are possible when the room is a significant one: a kitchen, a primary suite, a dining room built for entertaining. See recent whole-home projects →
Yes. A large share of our Elmhurst work is in the older housing stock around Wilder Park, Crescent Park and Eldridge Park: 1920s and 1930s Tudor Revival, Colonial and Craftsman homes with original millwork, plaster walls and small closed-off rooms.
These houses need a different approach than new construction. We design around existing woodwork rather than fighting it, and we plan for the reality that walls in a 1927 house are rarely square. See our Elmhurst gut renovation →
Yes, and it's the right time to start. For Elmhurst new builds we come in during framing to select finishes, lighting, plumbing, cabinetry and millwork before anything is ordered. Involving a designer at that stage prevents the change orders that derail a build later.
Elmhurst has a high volume of teardown-and-rebuild activity, particularly in Cherry Farm and north Elmhurst. We work directly with your builder and architect so interior decisions land on the construction schedule rather than after it.
Also serving
The same team works across DuPage County, western Cook County and Chicago.
