The 1860s Italianate house of a historian and collector of Scandinavian art and design
‘You cannot be serious,’ said the specialist painter as he applied the first few brushfuls of a bright yellow paint onto the lofty drawing room walls of this London house. The designer he was addressing, Stephan Eicker, was unfazed. ‘The owner trusts me,’ he replied, bidding the painter to carry on. The colour of the living room is one of the (many) aspects of the house that the owner loves. She explains that she and her husband bought the 1860s Italianate house, in which they live with their two sons, for its big, light rooms. ‘We loved the volume,’ she says. ‘All the original features were still here – the plasterwork, the curved door to the dining room. The fireplaces were stacked up in the coal shed, but they were all there.’
The owner is a historian and collector of Scandinavian art and design, a passion developed during a Masters degree in Sweden. ‘I love the measure, the simplicity and the quality of Scandinavian pieces,’ she says. On the walls of the ground-floor drawing room are works by Norwegian modernist painters Knut Rumohr and Jakob Weidemann. There is also an exquisite rug in delicate pinks and greys by another of her favourites, the Swedish rug maker Märta Måås-Fjetterström. A pair of stools by Josef Frank sits under the marble-topped tables, and there is an original eighteenth-century gilded Gustavian sofa against a wall. Stephan had two other sofas from the owners’ former house re-covered in velvet – one in yellow to match the walls, the other in turquoise. ‘I knew those colours would work well in here,’ he says. ‘The yellow wall colour is pleasant during the day, but at night it is amazing.’
The owner agrees that her guests seem to be energised by her bright drawing room, ‘It feels welcoming, celebratory. It gets people talking.’ After a drink in there (sometimes interrupted when guests ask for an art tour of the house), she leads them through to the pale blue dining room, lit by candlelight from a low-hanging antique French light. This room, with its long trestle table and sober grey Howe chairs, is characterised by its relative spareness.
A small library off to the side is a contrast in bold colours. Its walls are painted in a bright khaki-ish green called ‘You Call That a Pub’ by Colour Makes People Happy, which sets off the shaggy blue Scandinavian rug, a pair of armchairs in dyed ticking and a Josef Frank cabinet with prints of flowers pasted onto it. ‘I did ask Stephan if he was sure about the colour in here, but he has the world’s best eye. He just knows,’ says the owner. ‘He spotted that artichoke lamp base in a corner of an antique shop and, on the way back to the car, three people tried to buy it from us.’
Neutral colours reign in the kitchen below in the basement, with its Aga, cupboards by Plain English, a farmhouse table surrounded by antique Gustavian chairs, steel doors leading out to the garden and a handsome, well-stocked larder off to one side. The grey of the walls in here is continued up the stairs and into the main bedroom on the first floor.
Here, the simplest ingredients have made a calm but sophisticated room. Four Forties Swedish mirrors, used in the hall of the owner’s previous London house (featured in the October 2010 issue of House & Garden) are hung on either side of the bed, which has a headboard and matching lampshades covered in a handsome Turkish striped silk, handwoven on a narrow loom. There is a yellow mid-century rug by Märta Måås-Fjetterström beside the bed, with an antique Beni Ourain rug and a Howe ‘Greyhound Sofa’ sitting at its foot.
An oak-lined bathroom next door leads to a loo and linen cupboard, their floors laid with green handmade tiles in a herringbone formation. The oak continues seamlessly into a dressing room corridor, which connects the main bedroom and study. At the study end is a ‘Lamino chair’ by Yngve Ekström clad in a soft sheepskin. On the wall above is a painting by Knut Rumohr and, behind the chair, a light Moroccan kilim in bright stripes is used as a curtain. This is a microcosm of the meeting of the owner’s taste and Stephan’s.
On the top floor, looking at some patterned tiles in a spare bathroom, the owner explains, ‘I can go through an art auction catalogue and know exactly which pieces are right for me, but I can’t do it with things like tiles, as Stephan can. He has a wonderful sense of proportion, size and colour.’ And the clever mix in this simple room shows how they work well together. Stephan has paired the flower-patterned floor tiles with a grey cast-concrete sink, a black tap and a buttercup-yellow Victorian bath – and above it she has hung a glorious flower painting. They are two (design) hearts that beat as one.
James McDonald1/5A farmhouse-style table sits on rush matting from Rush Matters.
James McDonald2/5A picture by Alexander Calder hangs above the fireplace, in front of which Howe’s ‘Camembert Chairs’ surround a trestle table by Mike Smedley.
James McDonald3/5A daybed sits under an original stained-glass window in a recess in the hall.
James McDonald4/5Stephan had the antique bath re-enamelled in a bright yellow shade picked out by the floral painting above it, and found the tiles at Ecora.
James McDonald5/5Four Forties Swedish mirrors hang on either side of the bed. The ‘Greyhound Sofa’ at the end of the bed is from Howe.
