Frugalbits goes shopping with Alda Pereira, western Canada’s 2010 interior designer of the year.

Already considered one of Canada’s top interior designers with many awards and plenty of ink in glossy publications to her credit, Alda Pereira added another feather to her cap last month when a jury of her peers recognized her as Western Living magazine’s 2010 interior designer of the year.

While her private residential projects and multi-unit development interiors are always a delight to the eye, Pereira is no “shrinking wallflower looking to please multitudes,” commented Western Living editor Anicka Quin, who appreciates Pereira’s “knack for pairing the unusual with the well tailored.”

We love Pereira’s talent too—and her personality, which despite her early and prolonged success, is refreshingly unaffected. Pereira admits she loves to shop “Unabashedly. Period,” she says, “especially window-shopping. Did I mention that it’s free?” Here she shares a few of her favourite haunts. Read more