With 25 years of experience, Frog Hill Designs brings professional and personalized service to Interior Design projects helping clients achieve their design goals.  Focusing on clear communication and transparent budgets, we deliver comfortable and stylish spaces for our clients.  Frog Hill Designs works in all styles and prides itself on close collaboration with clients.  We work with a team of dedicated trades people and highly skilled professionals to make each project unique and custom tailored. Frog Hill Designs considers every job important; a small bath renovation or an entire home.  We work by the hour or the project to curate beautiful spaces in Alexandria, VA, or where ever any project develops.

My Story

Photographer Francois Gagne

I'm Betsy Barmat Stires, a professional Interior Designer and Allied Member of the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) based in Alexandria, VA. My design focus is trained on classic style with a fresh perspective. I create environments that are beautiful to look at and relaxing to be in. My favorite projects end with a successful mix of symmetry, quality furnishings, interesting finishes, personal art, and a sense of fine architecture. I love multi-layered interiors that are rich in texture and patina. My goal is always to find the essential elements of my clients' taste to help them create and then deliver a unique and inviting environment. 

For more than 25 years I have helped my clients with all aspects of residential home design. I am often involved in the planning and construction phases in addition to decoration of a wide range of projects types--- small or large in scope.  Often, my role is exclusively as Manager for the construction aspects of a project; often acting as a General Contractor.  Recently I completed my first commercial project; the public rooms for a boutique hotel, the Bayview Bar Harbor on Mount Desert, Maine.

My design practice is based on several important pillars of value: First, I aim for a trusting client/designer relationship that insures I can meet your objectives. Second, I have developed a spectacular group of tradespeople and artisans that work with me very carefully and conscientiously on everything they do to deliver a very high level of quality in their field. Whether developing a custom paint for your front door, a pattern to paint your floor, carefully applying a challenging wallpaper, planning a kitchen or bath, reupholstering and re-designing a favorite chair or laying new stone on your exterior walkway, my team will protect your home and my vision. Third, every budget is different and every home and client is unique; I pride myself on bringing all of my extensive experience, sound design judgement, and transparent business practices to each project; insuring individual and personalized results. I guide my clients to all the best and most interesting and practical design products in our region as well as utilizing the vast offerings that can be found around the world today via the internet and various distributors.  

I look forward to collaborative design projects with a profound focus on quality products, materials with integrity, and timeless design within many different style vernaculars.  My hope is that finished projects look like my clients homes; not my own.  I work on both interior and exteriors of my client's homes.

My fees are based on work by the hour or project and am very happy to discuss my fees and explain my consulting process via telephone or email.

​

​

​

​

Washington DC Design House

It was my pleasure to be one of the designers who contributed to the spectacular DC Designer Showhouse that benefited Children's National Health Center. The Washington Post recognized the kitchen I designed as one of the six spaces with great ideas. The room was complemented by the work of many of my design partners who routinely bring excellent work, energy, and creativity to my projects.

​

Photographer Angie Seckinger

The beautiful La Rochelle, a gilded age  1903 mansion in Bar Harbor, Maine, became a gorgeous Designer Showhouse in 2019.  I brought the formal dining room back to life with the expertise of a technical painter who created a jaw dropping shell pink "strie" wall treatment combined with a collection of beautiful furnishings and art, both old and new.  This vignette shows an 1800 Century French oil painting depicting lovers on horseback.  The lucite lamps bring a fresh look to the period antiuques displayed.

La Rochelle

Innovate and Interpret

The Bayview Bar Harbor Hotel was a design collaboration between myself and the Swan Hospitality Group.  The Bayview is a 26 room boutique hotel planted right next to Frenchman's Bay on Mount Desert Island, Maine.  It is located near the the entrance to Acadia National Park and has only ocean front guest rooms.  The hotel design is based on the needs of a "Modern and Luxurious" Rusticator.  The Rusticators were the first visitors to the Island known for their deep appreciation of the local natural surroundings and their use of creature comforts from home.

Photo credit : Swan Hospitality Group