Opera, Wall Street, and a Brooklyn Brownstone: The Unlikely Path That Made Sarah Reilley the Designer She Is Today

Sarah Reilley didn’t take the typical road to interior design. She studied opera at the University of Michigan, spent sixteen years climbing the ranks of finance — ultimately as a Managing Director at Apollo Global Management in New York — and renovated a Brooklyn brownstone from the studs up along the way. Now based in Bozeman, she runs Sarah Reilley Interiors, bringing a design sensibility that’s equal parts lived-in and elevated to homes across the Mountain West.

We sat down with Sarah to talk about the winding path that brought her here, what it really means to design a space that feels like you, and what she’s got planned for a certain Bozeman clubhouse that we can’t wait to see.

From Michigan to Manhattan (By Way of Boston)

Sarah grew up surrounded by creativity — her dad an attorney moonlighting as a woodworker and craftsman, her mom a vocalist with a doctorate in music. So studying vocal performance at U of M made sense. What didn’t make sense, at least to her at graduation, was going straight into a master’s program.

“I wanted to earn money and be independent,” she says. She landed in Boston, found a voice teacher to study with on the side, and walked into her first finance interview. She got the job. She called her dad to ask what a hedge fund was. He didn’t know either.

Music gradually faded as the work took over. She rose quickly — from reception to leading a team, with stints in London and Boston before landing in New York at Apollo, where she stayed for nearly twelve years. Finance, it turned out, rewarded the same things she’d always had: discipline, an eye for the puzzle, and the ability to collaborate with people.

“I liked being challenged. Even though it was far off the radar of what my real interests were, I was motivated. And it was steady income.”

But it wasn’t her calling. She knew that. And eventually, so did everyone around her.

The Brooklyn Brownstone That Changed Everything

Before Montana, there was Brooklyn. And before design clients, there was the gut renovation of her own brownstone — a top-to-bottom overhaul that Sarah took on herself with no design team, a limited budget, and a steep learning curve.

Neighbors who'd done their own renovations recently were her unofficial guides, pointing her toward suppliers, tradespeople, and lumber yards. Beyond that, she figured it out on her own. Every baseboard, every plaster finish, every design decision.

"Baptism by fire is sometimes the best way. You make mistakes, you make some good choices, and it all shakes out."

That renovation watered a seed that had been there all along. She loved it in a way she hadn't loved anything in a long time — and suddenly, a different future started to seem possible.

Sarah Reilley Interiors - Brooklyn Brownstone

Trading Brooklyn for Big Sky

The exit from finance came down to her husband Tim. His work required him to be closer to projects in Montana, which gave Sarah a clean story: this is the right move for our family. They’d go to Big Sky for a year. Just a test drive.

A few months after arriving, she dropped the kids at school and a mom invited her on a hike. By the end of the trail, Sarah had her first interior design opportunity. She offered to work for free. If it didn’t work out, no hard feelings.

It worked out. Friends of that family saw the work she was doing. That led to her first signed contract, her first full-freight paying client. Then another. And another.

“If I can stay up until midnight working and loving it, then this is right.”

Sarah Reilley Interiors - Montage Big Sky

What “Structured and Soulful” Actually Means

Ask Sarah about her design philosophy and she lands on a phrase that’s become something of a throughline: equal parts structured and soulful. But the execution, she’ll tell you, is more complicated than it sounds.

Every project starts with two voices: the architecture and the client. What does the structure tell you? How does it feel to move from outside to inside? Then: who are these people? How do they live, what’s their style, how do they entertain, are their kids going to be all over this couch?

“It can’t feel like home if it’s not them. I’m not designing for me or for a photograph, I’m designing for them.”

From there it’s about layering in the personal — art, textiles, objects, books, the kinds of things that give a space proof of life. Not a catalog home. A living one.

This, she says, is where her unlikely resume actually makes sense. The performance background gave her an instinct for people and expression. The finance background gave her project management, diligence, and the ability to detangle a complicated puzzle. The brownstone gave her the hands-on foundation. It all feeds in.

It also shows up in how she runs a project financially. Finance gave her the tools to budget a job down to the coffee table books — design hours, furnishings, freight, installation, all mapped out before work begins. Clients know what they’re getting into. “Design has become this opaque kind of trust fall,” she says. “Bringing transparency to that process is something I’m genuinely excited to do, and that my clients value enormously.”

Sarah Reilley Interiors - Catskills

Bringing a Little Brooklyn to Bozeman

Montana has a well-established visual language, particularly in Big Sky, where second homes tend toward a specific look: the ski chalet, the mountain modern retreat, the carefully rustic. Sarah gets it. She’s done plenty of it.

But even when she’s working in that mountain modern world, she’s always trying to bring some of her own mixology to the project — unexpected pieces, a little soul, something that keeps it from feeling one note. Since moving to Bozeman, she’s had more variety: a color-forward traditional project, some funky modern, some retro. She loves the range and the challenges that each project brings to bear.

The sourcing instinct is still deeply informed by her years in New York and time spent in Europe. She leans on makers and curators she knows from Brooklyn. She’s a genuine advocate for museum stores — MoMA specifically.

“They get it aesthetically. Interesting chess sets, beautiful games, funky accessories. Your kids can tinker with it and it looks good on a shelf.”

From those trusted starting points she branches out: Etsy rabbit holes, Pinterest spirals, image searches. She’ll fall fully down that rabbit hole and surface five hours later. It’s just how it works.

The Clubhouse Project

The project she’s in the thick of right now: the clubhouse for The Summits, a premier subdivision on Bozeman's south side near Hyalite Canyon. Her husband Tim is the developer. He gave her complete creative freedom. That, she'll tell you, is its own kind of pressure.

Without a client to push against, she built her own feedback loop — close collaboration with the architects, flat lays of furniture options reviewed by designer friends over wine, color palettes sound-checked against anyone who'd give her an honest opinion.

The details — the teal-drenched sitting room, the golf simulator lounge that very much refuses to be a bro zone, the buffalo made from a boat motor that lights up on the wall — deserve their own story. Installation is planned for Summer. Her long journey to interior design was pointing here all along, and the clubhouse is just the beginning of what's ahead.

RAPID FIRE

Bozeman or Big Sky? 

Bozeman. Convenience, variety, the college energy. I’m an introvert-extrovert — I like to be around life without having to know everyone in it. In Big Sky you can’t exactly escape into a crowd.

Favorite restaurant in Bozeman? 

Shan. I love the escape, I love the vibe. Great food. And then the total opposite answer is Five on Black — get in, get out, it’s all healthy, you feel good, and it’s cheap.

Go-to drink? 

Buttery Chardonnay or a Moscow Mule. I like something zingy.

Last splurge? 

Art. Always art. A painting called Night Swimming by Gigi Mills — two people floating in dark water, very moody, very cool.

Best burger in Montana? 

The Montage. It was melty and obscene.  It might have been brie. And they have gluten-free buns, so I could actually eat it.

Sarah Reilley Interiors is based in Bozeman. Explore her work at sarahreilleyinteriors.com or follow along at @sarahreilleyinteriors.