When your client is a genius, you may be asked: how can we change the idea of an unhappy past, while avoiding the tabula rasa?How can we make everything fit?

For this particular client there was a need to provide: a real kitchen without compromise; a room for conversation with a hearth; a quiet reading room; a study with a map of the world; an alcove with a private bathroom; a bunk bed for the children (with a dedicated bathroom of course);and even a two-seat Jacuzzi and a Japanese inspired genkan where one can leave ones shoes and walk barefoot.

The main challenges of the project were focused around the idea of memory. We were tasked at changing the living experience of the apartment in order to erase a dark and unpleasant past, while still taking the utmost care in ensuring that the physical history of the apartment, expressed in its materiality, could be preserved in all of its glory.

The materials which were decided to hold the greatest historic and aesthetic value were the cement floor tiles and the clear chestnut herringbone parquet flooring, both of which were preserved and restored. The rest of the apartment makes use of free standing and built in furniture elements of warm laminated birch plywood, bringing warmth to the apartment.

Material Used :
1. Floor Tiles: Existing cement tiles, restored
2. Flooring in bedroom: Resin, Kerakoll
3. Flooring in living room: Existing clear chestnut herringbone parquet, restored
4. Bespoke furniture: Laminated Birch Plywood, DonghiArredi&Projet Metal
5. Bathroom: Mosaic tiles, Bisazza
6. Wall Paint: Sikkens

7. Interior lighting:  
Suspended light, Parentesi, FLOS
Triangular Table lamp, BILIA, Fontana Arte
Ball Table lamp, Dioscuro, Artemide

8. Suspended light, Aggregato, Artemide
9. Fixed wall light, Rea, Artemide
10. Ceiling light, Teti, Artemide
11. Kitchen: Schiffini& Jasper Morrison
12. Library: Kriptonite
13. Coffee Table: Coffee Table, Isamu Noguchi, Vitra 
14. Spa and wet-room: Preformati Italia