Katie Parla Writes Best

By Morgan Goldberg

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What makes a purchase “worth it”? The answer is different for everybody, so we’re asking some of the coolest, most shopping-savvy people we know—from small-business owners to designers, artists, and actors—to tell us the story behind one of their most prized possessions.

Katie lounges on her sofa, with her collection of vessels in the background.

Katie Parla always wanted to live in Rome. Growing up in New Jersey with restaurant-industry parents, she fell in love with Italian food at an early age and set her sights on the pasta capital of the world. “I decided as a teenager that when I grew up I’d move here and live here forever,” she remembers. “That was the one thing that I knew to be true in my future.”

Two decades later, Katie is a widely recognized authority on Roman cuisine, a New York Times best-selling cookbook author, cohost of an Italian food podcast, and a popular culinary tour guide. She even launched her own Rome-based publishing company to produce her own titles locally, like the recently released Food of the Italian Islands.

“I'm obsessed with Italian artisanship,” Katie explains. “I love that a lot of things are still made here, and I love telling stories without having to polish the edges to fulfill the romantic vision that a lot of people have of Italy, so I wanted to have creative control.”

As an extension of Katie’s passion for Italian craftsmanship, the creative chose to rent a classic 1950s apartment in Rome’s Monteverde Vecchio neighborhood. The charming two-bedroom home is clad in walnut millwork that reminds her of a boat interior and provides plenty of storage for her collections of books, colorful vessels, and cookware.

Although many Roman rentals come fully furnished, Katie got lucky that her flat only included a marble-topped dining table (which happens to be ideal for rolling out pizza dough). She was able to curate the rest of the furniture herself, which she did by primarily shopping for midcentury Italian treasures at nearby vintage store Spot Gallery.

“It was, like, 400 euros or something,” Katie remembers. “I've seen it on 1stDibs for 2,700 [euros], and so I was like, ‘Okay, that's cool. Do you deliver?’ They wrapped it in a lot of bubble wrap, put it in their car, and carried it up into the apartment. And ever since then, it’s been my desk."

Katie’s favorite secondhand shopping find is a vintage Ico and Luisa Parisi for Cassina coffee table from the 1950s with an original dark rosewood frame and a new glass surface. “It's in really wonderful condition,” she says. “I love the intersections and the recesses and the different planes that things are working on. It has very clean lines. It's visually interesting and it looks different from different angles.”

The integral item is paired with a salmon velvet Saba sofa, an iconic Gio Ponti armchair, and an imitation Arco lamp. It’s covered in a rotating display of Katie’s many beloved objects that currently includes a potted plant, a Murano glass plate her boyfriend made, and her reads of the moment—with the spines facing out so they catch eyes.

Katie bought the Cassina coffee table in 2018, but its history is much richer. The designers behind it came of age during the fascist era, when women weren’t allowed to attend most schools in Italy. Instead, Luisa studied in Germany. She then brought the influences of that education to her partnership with Ico, which is evident in the silhouette of Katie’s coffee table. As an art history aficionado—she earned a bachelor’s degree in the field from Yale University—Katie deeply appreciates this narrative. “This couple was a real powerhouse in furniture design for five decades in Italy,” she adds. “They also informed the experience of office spaces during that time.”

Books, plants, and glassware sit on the glass top.

While this Cassina coffee table likely wasn’t intended to function as the center of a home office, that’s what the piece has ultimately become. It’s where Katie answers countless emails, plans delicious tours, and writes her cookbooks. “I fully have a desk, but I never ever used it,” she admits. “My feet are propped up on this glass surface when I’m working. I spend every day of my working life with this table.”

Rosewood & Glass Coffee Table by Ico Parisi for Cassina

1stdibs

Coffee Table by Ico & Luisa Parisi for Cassina, 1950s

Chairish

Gio Ponti Coffee Table in Wood and Glass by Figli di Amedeo Cassina 1950s Italy

1stdibs