A lavish new coffee table book featuring examples of interior design across the upper Midwest hit bookshops this week.
“Midwest Home: Interior Design in America’s Heartland” is Milwaukee-based architecture and interior design photographer Ryan Hainey and is published in hardcover by Schiffer Publishing.
The beautiful book opens the doors of 20 homes from Milwaukee, Chicago and beyond, highlighting a variety of designers and interior design styles across the region.
There are historic homes, new builds, renovated farmhouses, lake houses, urban homes, rural retreats and more – decorated in styles ranging from cozy to artsy to elegant and beyond – all captured by Hainey.
“There isn’t a single ‘Midwest style’ in the way people think of coastal design, but there are consistent characteristics,” Hainey says. “Homes here tend to be more rooted in function and seasonality—long winters, strong shifts in light, indoor-outdoor transitions that are very intentional. Materials often reflect wood, brick, stone – things that age well.
“There’s also less pressure to follow trends. I see a lot of work that’s quieter, more enduring, and tied to how people actually live. It’s less about statement and more about longevity.”
Hainey has worked toward this – his first published book – for about seven years, he says.
“Over time, I built an archive of projects that felt distinct – not just visually, but in how they responded to place and lifestyle,” he says. “From that larger body of work, I curated 20 homes.
“The filter wasn’t ‘best’ or ‘most expensive,’ it was range. I was looking for diversity in architectural language, materials, and ways of living. Some are modern, some traditional, some sit on lakefronts, others in dense neighborhoods – but each one feels grounded in its environment.”
Hainey said he worked with Carl Dellatore – who also wrote the foreword – for about two and a half years on creating something of a narrative with sequencing, pacing, “refining how the work is experienced as a book and artifact rather than just a collection of images.”
Hainey’s work is typically commissioned by architects, interior designers, builders and artisans, rather than strictly for real estate purposes.
“The goal isn’t to sell a home quickly,” he says, “it’s to document the design at a high level for portfolios, publications, and long-term marketing. The expectations, timelines and level of detail are very different.”
I asked Hainey about how he approaches the work when he’s landed an assignment to capture a home’s interior design.
“It starts with really seeing the space – understanding context, scale, material and light – and listening to the story behind the project,” he says. “I spend time with the designer to understand what mattered, what decisions were intentional, and how the home is meant to be lived in.
“From a technical standpoint, it’s a slow process: scouting composition, refining framing, editing the space, and then building or shaping light. A single image on average can take 30-60 minutes to construct. But the goal isn’t just accuracy, it’s interpretation. I’m trying to convey how a space feels, not just how it looks.
“Every project has a point of tension, something it’s trying to resolve. It could be the site, an existing structure, or a client’s lifestyle. I look for that underlying idea and build images around it. The approach shifts depending on the project rather than applying a fixed style.
“If a home is about quiet and restraint, the photos should feel that way. If it’s expressive or layered, the compositions can carry more complexity. The photography adapts to the project rather than applying a fixed style.”
The focus of the book, Hainey says, is the design rather than his photographs. After all, “Midwest Home” is in much larger letters on the front cover than Hainey’s name.
“The intent wasn’t to create a personal monograph, it’s more of a document of a design community,” he says. “Most residential interiors are never seen by the public. This book gives visibility to that work and to the architects and designers shaping the Midwest in a way that’s often overlooked nationally.
“In that sense, it functions as both a snapshot of this moment and a longer-term archive of how people are designing and living here.”
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press. A fifth collects Urban Spelunking articles about breweries and maltsters.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has been heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
