RBetancourt labordde residence, san juan, pr■
[ About ]■
Casa Casual is an interior design practice founded by Gretchen Rivera-Lebrón, serving residential, hospitality, and commercial clients in Puerto Rico, Washington, D.C., and Northern Virginia.
We begin each project by looking closely at the place, architecture, and people who will inhabit it, allowing those elements to shape a design that feels personal and connected to its setting.
[ About ]■
Casa Casual's Approach: Understanding People and Place Before Design
Researching the Layers of Place
Every space offers a starting point: the architecture, the setting, the way people move through it, and the things that make it feel personal.
Our first instinct is to understand how those elements relate before deciding where the design should go.
Casa Casual looks closely at the client, the history, and way the space needs to function, then develops the spatial planning, materials, furnishings, lighting, art, and styling as parts of one larger composition.
The goal isn't a recognizable Casa Casual look. It's an interior that feels cohesive, expressive, and unmistakably connected to the people who inhabit it and the place where it belongs.
[ About ]■
Good Design Begins With Understanding
Clients don't need to know exactly what the finished space should look like before they inquire. We bring the perspective and design judgment to clarify what isn't working, identify opportunities, narrow the possibilities, and guide the many interconnected decisions required to create a cohesive interior.
The result is a nuanced, layered, deeply personal design that feels considered, distinctive, and entirely at home in its setting.
[ About ]■
Personal Approach to Every Interior
For us, interior design begins with curiosity and listening.
We want to understand how clients live, what they respond to, where they naturally gather, what isn't working, and how they want the space to feel over time. Those observations help establish the design direction from the start.
Clients don't need a design vocabulary or a perfectly defined style. Part of our role is recognizing patterns in what they are drawn to and translating those instincts into a clear, cohesive point of view.
A room may feel wrong without an obvious reason. Ideas may compete rather than connect. Or a client may simply have too many possibilities and no clear path through them. We help turn that uncertainty into thoughtful, confident design decisions.
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Residential, Hospitality, and Commercial Interior Design Services Offered by Casa Casual
Casa Casual works across residential, hospitality, and commercial interior design.
Although the needs of a private home, restaurant, boutique hospitality property, or commercial environment differ, the starting point remains the same: understanding the people, property, purpose, and place before determining the design.
Across every project type, Casa Casual brings clarity to interconnected decisions so space, materials, furnishings, lighting, art, function, and atmosphere work together rather than being considered in isolation.
Residential, Hospitality, and Commercial Interior Design Services
Across every project type, Casa Casual brings clarity to interconnected decisions so space, materials, furnishings, lighting, art, function, and atmosphere work together rather than being considered in isolation.
Residential Interior Design
Casa Casual creates deeply personal residential interiors for complete homes, historic properties, apartments and condominiums, second homes, furnishing projects, and renovations.
Residential projects begin with how clients live, what they want from their surroundings, and what makes the property distinctive. The design is developed around those priorities rather than a predetermined aesthetic.
Casa Casual helps clients determine where to invest, how individual choices should relate, and what will make the finished home feel more fully like the people who live there.
Hospitality & Commercial Interior Design
Casa Casual designs hospitality and commercial environments where architecture, identity, function, and experience come together. From restaurants and boutique hotels to retail, corporate, institutional, and nonprofit spaces, each project begins by understanding what the place needs to communicate and how people will experience it.
We translate those considerations into a clear design direction, bringing architecture, materials, furnishings, lighting, and atmosphere into conversation. The result is a space that feels distinctive to its purpose and place, while supporting the people who use it every day.
Interior Design Services
Casa Casual offers three interior design service models, allowing clients to choose the level of design involvement that best fits the property, project scope, and way they want to manage implementation.
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Full-Service Interior Design
Full-Service Interior Design is Casa Casual's most comprehensive offering for residences, second homes, renovations, restaurants, and boutique hospitality projects.
The Casa Casual team carries the creative direction across the many interconnected decisions that shape the finished interior, from early concept through final installation.
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Design Direction for a Project You Manage
Design Direction suits clients who want Casa Casual's design concept, sourcing strategy, furnishings direction, and aesthetic guidance while handling purchasing, contractors, and implementation on their own.
It gives the people carrying out the project a clear creative framework to build from.
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Phone Consultation
A Private Design Consultation offers homeowners, second-home owners, restaurateurs, and hospitality clients focused, one-on-one guidance ahead of a major decision.
It’s a chance to think through a space with us before committing to a direction, a purchase, or a renovation.
Interior Design in Puerto Rico, Washington, D.C., and Northern Virginia
Casa Casual serves residential, hospitality, and commercial clients across Washington, D.C., Northern Virginia, and Puerto Rico.
The studio brings the same curiosity about people, architecture, culture, and place to each region without expecting interiors in dramatically different locations to share the same aesthetic.
Puerto Rico
Designing for Island Homes and Distinctive Properties
Casa Casual was founded in Puerto Rico, where we began designing homes and restaurants across San Juan before expanding the studio to the Washington, D.C. metro area in 2015. Today, Casa Casual works with clients in around San Juan, including Viejo San Juan, Miramar, Condado, Ocean Park, and Guaynabo. The studio also works with homeowners across the island, including Dorado Beach, Humacao, Río Mar, Bahía Beach, and Palmas del Mar.
Puerto Rico's architecture, climate, materials, visual culture, and relationship between indoor and outdoor living remain an important part of Casa Casual's work. These projects call for interiors that respond thoughtfully to both the property and the way clients live on the island.
Casa Casual approaches each Puerto Rico project without a predetermined island aesthetic, allowing the setting, architecture, and client to shape a design direction that feels particular to that place.
Washington, D.C. and Northern Virginia
Designing for Historic and Character-Rich Properties
Casa Casual works throughout Washington, D.C. area and Northern Virginia, including Georgetown, Kalorama, Cleveland Park, Capitol Hill, Dupont Circle, Old Town Alexandria, Middleburg, Historic Leesburg, Historic Occoquan, and Clifton Historic District.
The region's historic and architecturally distinctive properties have become an important part of Casa Casual's work. These homes often require careful judgment about how contemporary interiors can work with existing proportions, materials, craftsmanship, and details while supporting the way clients live today.
Casa Casual begins by understanding what gives each property its character, then determines where preservation, refinement, or change will create the strongest overall result.
Every space begins with its own story—its architecture, setting, character, and the people who inhabit it. Casa Casual considers these elements together, shaping thoughtful spaces through planning, materials, furnishings, lighting, art, and styling. The result is a personal, expressive interior that feels natural to its surroundings and true to those who live there.
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Meet Gretchen Rivera-Lebrón
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Founder and Principal Designer of Casa Casual
Gretchen notices things. The proportions of an old room. The relationship between contemporary art and traditional architecture. The subtle imbalance that keeps a room from feeling resolved. That instinct — to look closely before making decisions — has shaped Casa Casual from the beginning.
Gretchen Rivera-Lebrón is the founder and principal designer of Casa Casual. Her perspective reflects a deep understanding of how history, art, place, and personal meaning can shape an interior, informed by both her Puerto Rican roots and multidisciplinary design background.
Her multidisciplinary background shapes how she reads a space and how she brings proportion, composition, function, art, and atmosphere into a cohesive whole. Gretchen looks for what makes each client and property singular. She listens closely, develops a clear point of view, and helps clients make thoughtful decisions when the right answer isn't obvious.
Clients choose Casa Casual because they want more than a beautiful finished room. They value Gretchen’s thoughtful, personal approach: listening closely to how they live or work, understanding what they are drawn to, and recognizing the details that make a property unlike any other. The result is an interior clients can genuinely enjoy living with—one that feels cohesive, comfortable, and unmistakably their own.
Gretchen’s work is featured in Interior Design in Latin America, a 2026 bilingual book from teNeues that presents 28 design studios from 20 countries. The book features two Casa Casual projects: a 1930s private residence in Hato Rey and a coffee shop in historic Old San Juan.
She is also a trusted voice in the news media. Gretchen’s design expertise has appeared in Architectural Digest, MarthaStewart.com, Real Simple, Newsweek, Better Homes & Gardens, Apartment Therapy, and Southern Living.
“Gretchen’s work is featured in Interior Design in Latin America, a 2026 bilingual book from teNeues that presents 28 design studios from 20 countries. The book features two Casa Casual projects: a 1930s private residence in Hato Rey and a coffee shop in historic Old San Juan”
Tell Casa Casual About the Place You're Thinking About
You don't need to arrive with every design decision already made.
You may simply know that the rooms don't quite work together, the property needs to evolve, or you have too many ideas and need help finding the right direction.
Tell Casa Casual about the property, where it is located, how you use it, what feels unresolved, and what you hope the finished space could become.
We can turn those questions into a clearer design direction and guide the choices required to bring the space together.
Whether you are designing a primary residence, updating a historic home, creating a second residence, developing a restaurant or hospitality environment, or planning a commercial interior, every Casa Casual project begins the same way: with a conversation and a close understanding of what the space needs to become.
Inquire About an Interior Design Project
Frequently Asked Questions
[ FAQ ]
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Yes. Casa Casual can thoughtfully incorporate pieces a client already loves into a new interior rather than treating a redesign as a reason to start over. Existing pieces can become part of the larger design direction when they contribute meaning, character, or history to the space. Casa Casual considers how they relate to new selections so the finished interior feels cohesive rather than divided between old and new.
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No. Clients do not need to arrive with a defined design style or know exactly what they want the finished space to look like. Casa Casual's process includes understanding what clients respond to, how they want to live or use the space, what feels unresolved, and what they hope the finished environment will accomplish. Those observations help establish a design direction that feels personal rather than selected from a predetermined aesthetic.
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Yes. Casa Casual's residential work includes second homes, and the studio serves clients in both Washington, D.C./Northern Virginia and Puerto Rico. A second property in either region is approached with the same attention to that property's architecture, climate, and setting as a primary residence.
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Yes. Casa Casual's Full-Service Interior Design includes collaboration with other project professionals, so an architect or contractor already in place can be incorporated into the process rather than needing to be replaced.