Poetry Student Who Can't Stop Collecting.

''IN terms of my decorating style, I love stuff,'' Chase Cohl said. ''I love really unique and special stuff.'' Ms. Cohl, a 21-year-old poetry student at the New School, has a simple theory about accumulation and decor: ''If you pick up things that your personality is drawn to everywhere you go, you're bound to have an interesting space.'' The living room of the two-bedroom apartment she owns in SoHo is home to a motley array of items, including a zebra-print rug, a banjo (she's in a folk band), a petrified-wood end table and a vintage floor lamp with beaded fringe, bought at a local antiques shop. She found most of her furnishings, in fact, at antiques shops and flea markets (the Rose Bowl market in Pasadena is a favorite), except for the bed, which her mother picked out at ABC Carpet & Home. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]