About our team

Line drawing of a small table with a mounted lamp on top, placed against a wall.

Cathie Hong Interiors is a boutique interior design firm based in the South Bay Area. Our intimate team of designers specializes in creating unique and tailored homes in our signature organic modern style, with heavy influences from midcentury modern and Eastern Asian design. Our core values include thoughtful design, clear processes, and empathetic partnership with each of our clients.

A woman with long dark hair smiling and looking to the side, wearing a brown sweater, white high-waisted pants, black loafers, and an olive-green coat, standing in front of a white metal shutter.

Cathie Hong • Principal Designer and Founder

Cathie is a self-taught Korean-American interior designer. She is also a mom of four unique and creative children and often draws from her family experiences when designing spaces. She especially loves designing custom millwork and incorporating Asian-inspired themes into her designs. Her favorite non-design pastimes include jigsaw puzzle marathons and going on evening walks with her husband around their neighborhood in the foothills of Los Gatos.

Young woman with glasses and long black hair standing in front of a white, horizontally ridged wall. She is wearing a beige cable-knit cardigan, beige wide-leg pants, and white sneakers, and is smiling slightly.

Chianna Li • Project Coordinator

Chianna is a Bay Area native, who studied Bioengineering in college but after graduation, craved a role that combined creativity with her technical thinking. She loves that her role is able to support CHI on the backend as well as express her creativity in design. At the moment she is loving simple designs with fun patterns and color. On the weekends, you can find her spending time in her garden or starting her next DIY project.

Line drawing of a potted plant with multiple leafy stems and flowers on a black background.
A young woman with shoulder-length black hair, smiling, wearing a tan sweater, beige pleated pants, and white sneakers, standing on a sidewalk in front of a white rolling door.

Ellen Lee • Project Designer

Ellen is a project designer at CHI, expertly toggling back and forth between designing homes and drafting construction drawings and renderings to translate CHI’s designs to reality. She started her interior design journey through real estate staging and acquired her Bachelor of Science in Interior Design at San Francisco State University. Her current favorite design styles are Postmodernism, Japandi, and Mid-Century Modern with earthy neutrals and splashes of calming colors. She enjoys her weekends out in the sun eating at new food places with her husband and senior dog.

A woman with shoulder-length black hair smiling, wearing a beige blazer, white top, and dark blue pants, standing against a light green wall.

JEAN NGUYEN • operations manager

Originally from the New Orleans metro area, Jean brings over a decade of experience in project management and business operations to Cathie Hong Interiors. With a passion for both detail and flow, she gravitated towards interior design, where each day offers new opportunities to optimize team operations and client experiences. In her spare time, Jean expresses her creative side through photography and enjoys exploring new restaurants and neighborhoods with her family.

Smiling woman with long wavy dark hair wearing glasses, a brown satin shirt, a choker necklace, and earrings, standing in front of a green curtain.

JESSICA NORDLOFF • Project DESIGNER

Jessica, a project designer at CHI, was born and raised in the Bay Area and has a BFA in Interior Architecture. She supports the team by drafting construction documents and plays an active role in contributing to the overall design vision of CHI. Jessica enjoys integrating natural materials such as alabaster, marble and terracotta into her designs. Outside of work, you’ll find her running along the beach or through the streets of San Francisco, or chatting with her Book Club about the current book of the month.

Website design, branding, and illustrations by Blakely Hiner. Footer image credit: Korean Bojagi, patchwork rami, Korea, ca. 1940, © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.