Since the age of 6, Angelo Surmelis (sir-meh-LEASE) knew he had a gift for creating and designing innovative spaces. It was at this early age that he started dragging furniture around his parents' Chicago apartment. They tried to stop him, but quickly realized their apartment looked much better after he got his hands on it, and a career was born.
Always fascinated with design and motion pictures, he studied architecture, fine art and theater at Chicago's Columbia College. He designed and built sets for plays in Chicago and New York as well as designing and constructing window displays at major department stores. Surmelis later moved to Los Angeles, where he continued to freelance in design and event planning for clients in the film and TV industry before opening his own firm called Swell Space.
He helped launch two design shows in 2003, TLC's Clean Sweep and Lifetime's Merge, before signing on to be the head designer of HGTV.com's 24 Hour Design.
Surmelis will also be hosting HGTV's Rate My Space show, a TV spin-off from HGTV.com's popular Rate My Space community. Until the show's debut in 2008, you can find Angelo's weekly video "Spacecast" on HGTV.com, where he chats about the best and worst of Rate My Space.
Angelo Surmelis' Website: www.swell-space.com
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