‘In this apartment, the spaces were well organised,’ recalls Marie Deroudilhe of this home on the Seine. ‘On one side of the entrance, there was the children’s wing; on the other, the living areas, a space for the parents and a maid’s room connected by an interior staircase that’s now converted into an office and guest bedroom.’
However, the previous owners had wiped the slate clean of any typically Parisian decorative elements – mouldings, fireplaces, woodwork. Usually this would be cause for lamentation, but the architect and interior designer was liberated as well as sad, embracing the totally blank canvas.
She had fun blurring the aesthetic lines, sprinkling Italian influences into the entrance and kitchen, now united by a terrazzo floor, and introducing exuberant Memphis Group elements, such as Ettore Sottsass’ totem and the use of his eponymous Alpi veneer on the kitchen-cabinet fronts.
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On the other hand, we find the classical codes of a Parisian double living room, with its large volumes punctuated by French windows overlooking the Seine and the rooftops. Even here, though, Marie couldn’t resist subtly breaking the rules by covering the walls in a soft, luminous limewash that blurs its edges and designing a stepped masonry fireplace. A few beautiful pieces of furniture and artwork also give the room its character.
Elsewhere, the artistic journey continues, with the main bedroom and bathroom covered in a rose pink, expressed in different applications and materials, from polished concrete to carpet and paint, creating a cocooning bubble of intimacy.
Perhaps the biggest surprise is in the new office and guest room, which is bursting with colour and pattern; the ultimate antidote to urban greyness. In short, an inspiring blend of influences, humour and wonder. mariederoudilhe.com
