It may sounds odd; our last refurbishment of a private house in London was located in Wimbledon and our first one in Paris is near Roland Garros; but nothing to do with tennis. It is only pure chance, but sounds amusing to tell this story, that’s it.

 

Both projects are complete renovations. In the first case we dealt with a typical Victorian terraced house, but -in the second one- we face a brand new project; a one-storey apartment in modern style building surrounded by a huge park, in one of the greenest neighborhood around the city centre of Paris, Bois de Boulogne.

The apartment was supposed to be the Parisian reatreat of a middle age couple. He is an Italian entrepreneur and she is a journalist from Paris. For most of the year they live in Italy, near the Garda lake, but they often move to Paris where live part of the family. They are fond of yachting  and enjoy the style of life, the colours, the materials of the world of luxury ships. They also are keen on modern and contemporary art.

 

The project is a blend of their needs, interests and tastes. The design choices are a compromise between the two different opinion of the couple about every specific iussue, but the final arrangement doesn’t seem to show it. The strong personality of the design project combines together the two in one, like happens when the strong  personality of a son merges the ones of his two parents.

In comparison with the huge renaissance villa where they live in italy,  this two-hundred square meters apartment in Paris looked too small to host all their requirements.  But we took the challage; we dared and tore down all the walls and designed this interiors like yacht; every single square centimeter is been used, no space is lost ( don’t forget the lesson of the Machine ad Habiter by Le Corbousier) . In the end, we obtained a small hallway, a huge living room, a kitchen, two bedrooms, three bathrooms and even a small gym; a Tecnogym tapis-roulant was hidden into a closet.

The palette of materials is rich and sophisticated and it consists of selected European oak on the floor; a wonderful Calacatta marble for the main bathroom and the boiserie of the sitting room; pure linen woven by hand for the curtains; light colored leather in the main bedroom; belts of cognac leather for the main wall which contains the tv behind a vertical sliding door; fluted panels of whitened sycamore for the dining room and an impressive veneer of teak which works like a fil rouge throughout the apartment.

In the end, the priceless pieces of modern art were placed in their niches and – shall we say-  all the interior design embodies a sort of empty sculpture; the best collector’s item, unique like  the owners.