Da Un Anno
A year has passed since I unpacked all of our stuff that came down here from Sweden on April 2, 2022. I literally worked like an unstoppable robot for 24 hours to unpack and put every little item into its particular spot before heading to the airport the following day. The furnishing as well as the house has since underwent some lived-in changes. The studio, which was supposed to be my actual studio for painting, working with ceramics, and creating other arts and crafts, has become my study: here is where I spend hours and hours writing my thesis. I am fond of switching positions and I need loads of coziness to make myself comfortably thrifting away into my flow (of writing). Thus, the rug, puffs, sofa, and armchair, take turn acting chairs, tables, and foot rests. The furnishing of this room has come about as I have worked in it, and though I loved sitting on the comfy duvet in the beginning, I am happy to have replaced it with our gorgeous rattan couch (which also makes for a much inspiring view when seating in the opposite side of the room).
Then we have the patina walls of the “old” rooms of the house. That is, of the living room, dining room, and the (nowadays space of the) kitchen. We have spent lots of time carefully preserving these beauties of aged walls, mostly because I absolutely love the worn and torn feel of the olden and rugged, but also because I am allergic to white. Or at least, so I thought I was. I will soon get back to this, but first note that Freddie — the more sober-oriented of designers that he is, at least compared to me, who loves colors, textures, and patterns in wide ranges of mixed and (un)matched — had got his wish through to have the studio painted in a creamy white. Though I at the time fought hard to have the natural stone left raw, I am incredibly thankful that he convinced me otherwise. I do not think that I would have found such peace in that room, would the walls not have been dreamingly creamy, which makes the glass block wall as well as the cocciopesto floor softly pop. Thanks amore for convincing me of that which I could not imagine to cherish as much as I do.
The atmosphere in the studio is above and beyond, and so is that in the other spaces, almost all white as they have become. The living room and dining room are now both white through-and-through, and the kitchen has got some coloring it too. Starting with the kitchen, I was crazy mad when we found out that we had to redo the roof, for I just loved the olden touch of the ceiling. That’s a crazy thought right there, at least in retrospect; not only because the roof was so damaged that it could have fell down any second, but also because it was terribly ugly looking. I see that now, was oblivious to it then, but that does not matter, for it had to be redone. So redone it was and allergic to white as I was, I painted the new one with a special pinkish color that had a fading character to it. I hated this, for several months actually, until I one day had enough and painted it (and one of the walls) with the same dark green botanical noir color that we have in the bedroom. Love, love, love—the bedroom as well as the kitchen.
The story with the recoloring of the other two rooms is a bit different, for we would have kept them patina, would it not had been for two reasons. Firstly, the anti-mold treatment that we used in the ceiling in the living room reacted with the paint, which made it all fall down, leaving the ceiling white. While many actually chooses to paint the star-ceiling in a contrasting color, I am more allergic to that design-idea than to white, so there was nothing to do but to paint the entire space in a coherent color. Once we had done so in the living room, it felt rather natural to do the same in the dining room. It simply creates a sense of harmony having both rooms in the same coherent color. And speaking of harmony, the reason that the choice landed on white is not mainly because it is an easy color when it comes to yearly treat any molded area that comes around during the humid time of winter. The color choice actually had to do with harmony, or with an nonchaotic sense if you will. For to be frank, we felt that it is enough chaos having to clean everything every time we get down here, and having our mostly fun but also demanding jobs to juggle, we just felt that white made for the least chaotic sensation coming to the house. Not necessarily being in it, but coming to it. So secondly then, we wished for a harmonious feeling thinking about coming home, for which reason it is now almost all dreamingly creamy white (of course with a huge touch of our personal quirkiness and love for mixed-and-matched-old-and-new-functional-and-aesthetica style).
We have tried to make the house look much like if we just moved in as it was, with furniture and all (which one realizes is not the case when reading/viewing Before, during, current). The little old picture of Saint Lucia still hangs in the same spot as when we bought the house, before the renovation. It has now got a bit of an (un)sacred touch with the neighboring wine shelf. Much of the larger furniture were acquired at mercatini, making them fit in rather nicely. I love all of our bargains, for that is truly what they are, but I am absolutely obsessed with the vintage mirror that we got for the bathroom. Let alone, the bathroom itself.
