design for living

design for living
issue 04 / winter 2013/14
AXEL VERVOORDT’S SERENE INTERIORS / LUXURY LACE / LES TROIS GARÇONS / BONHAMS’ 21ST-CENTURY REVAMP
THE BALVENIE MASTERS OF CRAFT / GALLERIES AND GASTRONOMY IN LIMA / OLGA POLIZZI’S HYDE PARK HOUSE
A KYOTO SAKE TOUR / HOME GYMS / AMANGIRI, UTAH’S DESERT RETREAT / BRIDLE HIDE / JADE JAGGER’S TOP 10
01COVER1213.indd 1
26/11/2013 15:00
bertrand limbour
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As a collector first and interior designer second, Axel Vervoordt has a distinct perspective,
with a fine-tuned sense of how objects work together. A new book highlights some previously
unseen projects, all connected by the way they respond to natural light / By Ruth Corbett
photography: laziz hamani
Axel Vervoordt
Axel Vervoordt got the collecting bug
early. Aged just seven, he would happily
accompany his mother on trips to galleries
and museums, drinking in the art and
antiquities as thirstily as most kids his
age guzzled lemonade. By 14, he was
making solo trips to London from his
Antwerp home, buying silver, furniture
and paintings to sell to friends’ parents. “I
wanted to be a collector,” he says, “and by
building good relationships with people
like The National Trust, I was able to gain
access to the most amazing things. By my
early 20s I already had a good collection.”
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Today, Vervoordt is the founder and
guiding light behind Axel Vervoordt
Ltd, a company with interests ranging
from interior design, architecture and
art collecting, property restoration and
development, and product design. Revered
throughout the worlds of art and design
as a tastemaker of great influence and
integrity, his clients include writers and
musicians, royals and rock stars; those who
value his skill for mixing antiques with
modern art and Old Masters with modern
interiors, to create cultured, awe-inspiring
living spaces. But Vervoordt insists that >
opposite: A Côte
d’Azur villa that’s
serenity itself. With
his typical visual
dexterity, Vervoordt
pairs a Steinway with
an abstract seascape by
Japanese photographer
Hiroshi Sugimoto
/ALTO/
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above: Views of the Mediterranean sea frame
some rare modernist furniture Ω a pine desk and
prototype metal and leather chair by Charlotte
Perriand, and a Pierre Jeanneret armchair
opposite: The Delft-tiled dining room of a 16thcentury Italian house, with linen-covered Louis
XIV chairs and a slate-topped table that was made
in Vervoordt’s Belgian workshops
interior decorating – a phrase he dislikes –
is about much more than aesthetics.
He reveals this in the foreword to a
new monograph, Axel Vervoordt: Living
with Light, in which he says: “Our taste
corresponds to a philosophy – a way
of life – rather than an expression of a
certain style or fashion. This philosophy
includes a quest for the universal spirit.
Great art is timeless, and it’s important to
be surrounded by art and objects that not
only reveal the essence of the time in which
they were created, but also transcend
time. Every project we are a part of aims
88/89
to search for harmony and balance within
art, architecture and nature.”
The art of such harmonious living is
cleverly unpicked in this weighty volume,
through 15 bespoke interiors, all recently
designed by Vervoordt’s firm. These
exceptional (and mostly previously unseen)
homes are in coastal, urban and rural
locations, each one using natural light
as an essential component of its design.
There is a house in Provence that was once
owned by Picasso, a minimalist villa on
the Côte d’Azur, a couple of extraordinary
yachts and a fashion designer’s very cool
Manhattan apartment, among others.
“My son Boris, who looks after the daily
management of the business with his
brother Dick, was the creator of this book,”
says Vervoordt. “I helped him a little, of
course,” he adds, with the hint of a chuckle.
Vervoordt likes depth in interiors,
as opposed to superficiality, and finds
the spirit of things more important than
how they look. “I really don’t mind if
things are ugly,” he says. “Ugly things
with authenticity often have their own
beauty, but you may have to look hard to
see it.” He says the most essential element >
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