Lifestyle
She gave her drab L.A. apartment a stunning makeover for $2,500
As an art director with a background in theater, Mary Kenny has a flair for interior design that rivals her skills as an event planner in the entertainment industry.
For her, there is no such thing as “too busy” when decorating her 600-square-foot apartment. “I like to have a sense of humor,” says the self-described maximalist. “Your home shouldn’t be too serious. I want my space to feel balanced between funky and chill.”
Mary Kenny’s living room in her Los Angeles apartment before she moved in.
(Mary Kenny)
Kenny, a native of North Carolina, is accustomed to living small. Before moving into her apartment a little over a year ago, she lived in a 250-square-foot bachelor apartment without a kitchen.
“I traveled all the time,” she says, justifying life without a stove and refrigerator. Then the pandemic hit. “I spent a year there,” she says. “Thankfully, it was only $1,000 a month.”
When it came time to find a more appropriate apartment in Los Angeles, where more than half the population is renters, she had difficulty tracking down something she liked that she could afford. “The listings would say there’s laundry, and there wasn’t. Or there was parking, and there wasn’t.”
She says the apartment she eventually moved into isn’t perfect, but it’s rent-stabilized at $1,700 a month. “I always dreamed of owning a home,” she says. “It’s hard to accept that it’s not the American Dream anymore.”
A thrifted sofa, drop cloths, a Magic 8 Ball — Mary Kenny’s apartment in L.A. is a stylish retreat that didn’t break the bank.
At a time when thrifting is booming for its economic and environmental benefits, especially among Gen Z consumers, Kenny, herself a millennial at age 36, has shown that it’s possible to create a stylish, humorous and budget-friendly retreat with secondhand finds.
Spending roughly $2,500, she has transformed an unremarkable one-bedroom apartment with gray vinyl floors into a vibrant representation of who she is: colorful and fun.
“I’m not afraid of mixing patterns and textures,” she says.
With a resourceful eye, Kenny has furnished her apartment with Facebook Marketplace finds, thrift store treasures and free hand-me-downs from friends. Her resourcefulness is not just impressive; it’s inspiring. She proudly estimates that her apartment is about 80% thrifted. Her only new splurges? A standing desk for her work-from-home setup and colorful, one-of-a-kind hand block-printed bedding from Anthropologie.
Not a big cook, Kenny says the kitchen is her least inspired room. She left the all-white kitchen as is and added colorful accessories. (Mary Kenny)
“I don’t like to spend money,” says Kenny. She humorously refers to herself as a “cheapskate” who constantly looks for unique pieces on Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist. Like her, her home is a work in progress, continually being reinvented.
Among her many bargain finds is a plush velvet sofa she purchased for $80 on Facebook Marketplace. “If my cats scratch it up, I can sell it for 50 bucks when I leave,” she says. Her queen-size bed is a hand-me-down from a friend. To make custom curtains similar to those she spotted at Anthropologie, she dyed a 6-by-9-foot canvas drop cloth from Harbor Freight, which cost $6.99. She says, “I cut the drop cloth into two panels, dyed them with fabric dye and then sewed them together.” If you don’t sew, don’t worry, she says, “you can cut them with pinking shears or use no-sew iron-on tape.”
A signed makeup wipe from Kenny’s favorite drag queen and black-and-white-checkered peel-and-stick vinyl flooring make a statement in the bathroom.
Kenny’s bathroom before she moved in.
(Mary Kenny)
Kenny doesn’t think twice about stuffing furnishings from her treasure hunts into the back of her tiny Nissan Versa — she has been known to secure items with bungee cords — or repurposing everyday ephemera into something special.
“There was an episode of Marie Kondo’s ‘Tidying Up’ where she suggested displaying sentimental items rather than keeping them in boxes under the bed,” Kenny says of the family mementos, airline tickets and pet portraits she has on display in her gallery wall. Other items, such as a collection of greeting cards attached to a bulletin board filled with buttons, paper hearts and photo booth pictures, demonstrate the importance of her few family heirlooms. “I wish I had more,” she says. “I’ve moved around a lot and was never able to keep larger things.”
Above her couch, she has hung her most prized family possessions: photos of her grandmother featured in the Evansville Press in Indiana in 1964 after she learned to skydive and joined a parachute club.
Mary Kenny created a mural on printable wallpaper by transferring a botanical print onto her wall using a projector, tracing it with a pencil, painting it with acrylic craft paint from Michaels and then outlining it with a Krink paint marker.
(Mary Kenny)
When asked for tips on arranging a gallery wall, Kenny recommends laying it out on the floor first. “I used to do brown paper templates and be really picky,” she says, “but now my strategy is just maintaining lines. I pick one item to be the center and move outward from there, trying to line up the bottom of the first item with the bottom of the second, then the third item lines up with the top of the second and so on.”
When it comes to hanging the frames on the wall, she swears by a blue tape method by @lemonleafhomeinteriors that she viewed on TikTok.
But Kenny’s apartment is not just about thrifting; it also showcases her versatile do-it-yourself skills. She created a vibrant botanical mural in the dining room by transferring the pattern onto Tempaper & Co. paintable removable peel-and-stick wallpaper using a projector, tracing it with a pencil and painting it with affordable acrylic craft paints from Michaels. Outlined with a Krink paint marker, the oversize gerbera daisy mural makes a statement from every room in the apartment. “The mural is a fun way to add color to walls without having to repaint when you move out,” she says.
In her bedroom, Kenny splurged on bedding from Anthropologie and hung kantha quilts from Etsy on the wall using a staple gun.
(Brittany Brooks / For The Times)
The bedroom featured gray vinyl flooring and blinds on the window before she moved in.
(Mary Kenny)
Kenny notes that the “rental-friendly” peel-and-stick mural and bathroom decor are removable and that she restores the walls and fills any holes upon move-out; however, it’s always best to check with your landlord before you embark on your own renovations.
To provide privacy from a nearby apartment building in her Larchmont neighborhood, Kenny put Prism privacy film on the windows of her kitchen and living room and installed NoNo no-drill curtain brackets, specifically designed to attach to mounted blinds. “It’s a rental-friendly way to hide” blinds, Kenny says.
Though she has a keen design sense, Kenny likes to use the free online tool Floorplanner, which creates 3-D floor plans. The tool helps her understand the scale of the items she’s buying and how they’ll all fit together in her space. “It’s immensely helpful,” she says. “You can experiment with different layouts and furniture arrangements before making any purchases.”
Of all the places to make a statement, however, Kenny says money goes a long way in the bathroom. “Bathrooms are the perfect place to be silly,” she says of her lipstick kiss-themed bathroom, inspired by a makeup wipe she purchased from her favorite drag queen, Tammie Brown, on Instagram and later framed. “I used peel-and-stick wallpaper, Tempaper & Co. paintable wallpaper and a faux flexible chair rail to transform this space. The floors are black-and-white checkered peel-and-stick vinyl. I wanted it to feel over the top.”
She succeeded.
Above her couch, she has hung her most prized family heirlooms: newspaper photos of her grandmother from 1964, after she learned to skydive and joined a parachute club. She also framed and hung her grandmother’s charm bracelet on the gallery wall.
Looking back to when she was growing up, Kenny recalls begging her mother to let her redo her bedroom. “I painted the walls and outfitted the two twin beds with leopard-print bedspreads,” she says. “I feel like I’m still in that stage.”
For her next project, Kenny hopes to move to a two-bedroom soon. “I’m working on becoming a foster parent,” she says.
The prospect of reimagining another blank slate and starting anew is enticing for the creative force. “I think I’d sell things that feel easy to come by, not especially unique or actually vintage,” says Kenny. “My favorite thing is selling something for the exact amount I bought it for. It’s like I rented it for free. My second favorite thing is not having to move it myself.”
Whimsical accessories and family heirlooms are a testament to Kenny’s creativity and resourcefulness.
Makeover budget
Here, Kenny — a “track every expense” kind of person — breaks down the budget for her rental apartment makeover.
Entrepreneur David Huang tests out a VR headset while conducting demonstrations of the social dance lesson app Dance Guru at the Augmented World Expo in Long Beach, Calif., June 17, 2026.
Chloe Veltman/NPR
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Chloe Veltman/NPR
Wedding season is in full swing, bringing with it a familiar sense of dread for anyone who fears the dance floor.
But relief may finally be at hand with the help of a new app, Dance Guru, and a virtual reality (VR) headset.
The social dance instruction app transports users to a spacious, digital dance studio. Waiting inside is a computer-generated coach: a handsome, male avatar wearing a shirt open to his navel. He speaks with a slightly gravelly English accent.
“Watch me now,” he instructs at the start of a waltz lesson — which NPR tried out at the Augmented World Expo in Long Beach, Calif., an annual conference showcasing the latest developments in virtual and augmented reality.
The avatar then demonstrates a basic box step.
From there, the lesson becomes interactive. The coach tells the user to hold his hand while an electric pinging sound tracks the student’s foot placement.
“One, two, three, four, five, six,” the virtual teacher counts down.
When the user stumbles, he remains remarkably patient. “Do not worry, foundations take time. Let’s try that again. Work on grounding your steps more intentionally.”
Solving the beginner’s dilemma
Dance Guru creator David Huang said he came up with the idea for the app a couple of years ago out of frustration.
“I always wanted to learn to dance and I was always terrible at it,” Huang said. “And I always ended up stopping midway through the lessons.”
He soon realized that many beginners hit the exact same roadblocks.
“Private lessons are too expensive, and you feel like you’re always forgetting the dance steps,” Huang said. “You cannot find a partner to dance with. So I figured maybe I can create something like this.”
The Dance Guru platform currently offers tutorials in salsa, bachata, waltz, and cha-cha, in both lead and follow modes. To make the digital instruction feel authentic, Huang used motion-capture technology to record the movements of real-life dance teachers — with their permission.
Building on the legacy of online tutorials and video games
Dance Guru belongs to a small but growing wave of apps using VR to demystify social dance. At a nearby booth, conference attendee Victor Chen is testing out a competing app called Trip the Light. It currently offers salsa lessons, as well as freestyle options, where a user can dance with a partner without having to learn specific steps.
Trip the Light’s booth at the Augmented World Expo included posters of the app’s virtual instructors. Real-life performers, who gave Trip the Light permission to motion capture their movements, were used as a basis for these avatars.
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Chloe Veltman/NPR
“A lot of times when you’re trying to learn a choreography, it’s watching a YouTube video and you have to pause it, rewind, and play it,” Chen said. “If you were to have a virtual avatar dancing in front of you and correcting for any parts that you missed, it might be a lot easier.”
Interactive video games like Dance Dance Revolution and Just Dance, and YouTube tutorials have been helping people improve their skills in private for years. But those games are mostly aimed at solo players. Unlike the new generation of immersive VR apps, they cannot simulate the mechanics or confidence required for partner dancing on a live dance floor.
The reality check
But this kind of app won’t work for every dancer.
“Everyone learns a little bit differently. And so unless you have a game that has lots of different ways of teaching, you’re going to have things that work for some people and don’t work for others,” said Ariana Katana, a trained contemporary dancer and dance content creator who’s active on YouTube, Twitch and other platforms. “Also, it’s hard to dance with a headset on.”
And then there’s the issue of not being able to physically feel a virtual partner’s hand or shoulder while dancing with them. Patrick Ascolese, the creator of Trip the Light, said the experience could become more tactile in the future. “Haptic suits and wearables will be coming, but I think we’re a little away from that,” he said.
Ascolese said even with their limitations, immersive tools like Trip the Light have immense potential as judgment-free training grounds — giving reluctant dancers the baseline confidence they need to eventually step onto the dance floor with real partners in the real world, including at weddings.
“Just like anything else, practice makes perfect,” said Ascolese. “So the more time you spend in VR with a virtual partner, it works towards helping you get over that social hurdle. We are teaching you the moves that you have to do in order to go out and have fun.”
Jennifer Vanasco edited the broadcast and digital versions of this story. Chloee Weiner mixed the audio.
For half a century, Deidre Hall has taken on every kind of disaster in the drama-packed town of Salem, Ill., as a star of “Days of Our Lives.”
There was the time — actually, it happened twice — when her character, Dr. Marlena Evans, was famously possessed by the devil and even levitated.
In Sunday Funday, L.A. people give us a play-by-play of their ideal Sunday around town. Find ideas and inspiration on where to go, what to eat and how to enjoy life on the weekends.
Or the time a serial killer, who was actually Marlena under hypnosis, seemed to kill several beloved characters. The long-running show’s storylines have become legendary, and in March, while promoting “Hail Mary,” actor Ryan Gosling even gave Hall a shout-out, admitting he was a fan, praising the hard work of soap opera actors and calling her an “OG acting inspiration.”
But Hall’s real life in Santa Monica is much quieter than her character’s, and she likes it that way.
“When I bought my house in Santa Monica, I didn’t realize how great it would be to live near Montana Avenue,” says Hall, 78, about the popular shopping spot. Every day, she walks to the main street with her golden retriever, Riley, and enjoys Pilates, art and good food along the way. “The owners of the Farms Market even keep dog biscuits, so guess where the dog wants to go every time we walk — the Farms, of course,” she says, laughing.
When she isn’t filming the daily soap opera, which airs on Peacock, Hall enjoys raising monarch butterflies, exploring the shops and restaurants on Montana, and hosting movie nights at home with her two sons.
Here’s what a perfect day in L.A. looks like for her.
This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for length and clarity.
7 a.m.: Breakfast and dog walk
I usually kick off my day with a protein shake, feed our golden retriever and take her out for a walk. She’s a phenomenal girl. When we adopted her, her name was Riley, but I did think about naming her after Mrs. Hughes from “Downton Abbey.”
10 a.m.: Church and garden time
After I walk the dog and go to church, I like to spend some time in my yard. I’m not a natural gardener, but I really enjoy it. I started raising monarch butterflies because my identical twin sister, who played my twin on the show, planted a butterfly garden. Monarchs are amazing because they are transitional. Every year, they travel from Mexico to southern New England, but it’s getting harder for them. Their numbers have dropped by about 80%. To help, I plant milkweed, which is what they need to survive. I buy my milkweed from the Staghorn Garden on Wilshire Boulevard in Santa Monica. Julie, who owns the nursery, is delightful and has a wide variety of milkweed. The monarchs always seem to find my garden. Julie was raising some caterpillars too, and she cared a lot about them. We talked about how important it is to help the butterflies. That’s why I do this. Sometimes I get milkweed with eggs already on it, and Julie knows her butterflies are going to a good home.
1 p.m.: Walk to Montana Avenue for some lunch
I live near Montana and love taking long walks, going to Pilates and trying out the great restaurants nearby, like R+D Kitchen and La La Land. I’m a big fan of the waffles at the Courtyard Kitchen. Just a few days ago, I had a chicken salad on raisin bread with an Arnold Palmer, and it was delicious. It is right on Montana and has a nice outdoor seating area. It’s one of my favorite spots. La La Land always has a long line in the morning, which is perfect if you want coffee. They serve coffee, doughnuts, croissants and avocado toast. There’s plenty of outdoor seating, and you can even bring your dog.
2 p.m.: Peek inside a clock shop
There’s a small clock shop on Montana Avenue that’s closed on Sundays, but if you walk by, you’ll see all kinds of clocks — standing, table and wall clocks. The owner is great at fixing them. Once, I bought a wall clock from MacKenzie-Childs, but it didn’t work. And I was really upset because it matched everything else on my countertop. I brought it to the owner and said, “I love this, but I can’t make it work.” He fixed it right away. His name is John, but I call him Geppetto. And we all know why. He really does have a magic touch.
2:30 p.m.: Visit a neighborhood art gallery
Ten Women Gallery is run by 10 artists, all of whom show their work there. I was drawn to some watercolors there, bought a few cards and spoke with one of the artists. She told me, “You seem to love watercolors,” and mentioned that the artist who painted them, Pamela Harnois, lives in Los Angeles and teaches nearby. I got Pamela’s name and found out she taught at the Brentwood Art School. I was so inspired by her gift that I started taking private lessons with her on Saturdays. That gallery is where I discovered my love for watercolor painting.
3 p.m.: Grab some ice cream at Rori’s
The other day, my longtime girlfriend wanted to get ice cream and told me, “We are walking to Rori’s Artisanal Creamery.” It’s a small shop on Montana near Lincoln. They make everything themselves, using local ingredients from grass-fed cows with no added hormones. The place is family-owned and probably has the healthiest ice cream you’ll find. They switch up their flavors often, but my favorite is the salted caramel.
6 p.m.: Family dinner and movie night at home
R+D Kitchen is always packed, so my sons, who are 31 and 33, do the cooking. They come over, and together we make salads and cook dinner. There’s a neighborhood grocery store called the Farms, off Montana, a small family-run place that has everything we need. Everyone knows each other there, and people bring their dogs. We try to have movie night every Sunday. Sometimes the day changes, but we always make sure to have one night a week where we cook a meal and sit down as a family. Keeping that tradition has become really important to us. My sons are great cooks, which is funny because they definitely didn’t get that from me. [Laughs]
9 p.m.: Take Riley for one last walk and visit neighbors
After dinner, I take my dog for a walk. It’s a great way to meet neighbors. We always go around the same block. We’ve met so many people, and since she’s a golden retriever, she loves meeting everyone.
10 p.m.: News, knitting and bedtime
I am a news junkie, so I usually watch whatever is on the news before I go to bed. I have a long-standing passion for knitting. Lately, though, the news would make me drop a stitch.
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