Heaven Eleven - Rick Anthony Bonner

THE RADAR | DESIGN
POWER SHOWER: Designer
John Gidding in the mod-luxe
bath portion of his multiroom
loft tableau. The custom wall
is handmade of undulating
natural wood. Furnishings
are by Artefacto.
Heaven Eleven
Artefacto and eleven designers reinvent the show house with sexy ponyhair seating, daring white croc upholstery and even a luxe lobby bar
| By Amanda Lester Trevelino | Photography by Erica George Dines |
Warning: This is not your grandmother’s (or
even your mother’s) decorators’ show house.
At Brazilian furniture purveyor Artefacto’s
inaugural interior design lab known as “Style
House” fusty chintz, frou-frou valances and
Regency sideboards are abandoned in favor of
Artefacto’s sleek, contemporary furnishings—
tricked out in everything from croc to chrome—
and custom-made to the specifications of 11 of
Atlanta’s most fearless interior designers: Wendy
Blount, John Gidding, Michael Habachy,
Haitham Haddad, Darcy Harris, Joel Kelly,
Shon Parker, Rick Bonner and Rina Andrejev,
Robert Spiotta, Bo Waddell and Jason Wertz.
This hip, young “dream team” of modern décor
masters have taken the show house concept out of
the traditional manse and delivered diverse and
innovative living environments in the compact
10,000 square feet of space on the second floor
of Artefacto’s Buckhead showroom. And by the
looks of the mobbed opening night bash, the
project is introducing a whole new generation of
trendy scenesters to the show house concept.
Rooms range from a mod outdoor lounge
courtesy of Rick Bonner and Rina Andrejev, to
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a gilded, Asian-accented boutique hotel lobby
imagined by of-the-moment designer Wendy
Blount. The latter is punctuated with a starburst
studded wall, provocative revolver lamps by
Philippe Starck and sultry persimmon light
fixtures. “This is a really original idea for Atlanta,”
says Jason Wertz of Wertz Contemporary Design
who applauds Artefacto for having the vision to
invite emerging and established talents to create
unique vignettes using their collection.
In fact, the concept is the brainchild of
Artefacto Owner, Paulo Bacchi. Based in
Brazil, Bacchi flew into town for the September
opening of his first annual Style House in
the U.S. “We are committed to showcasing
provocative design,” says Bacchi, whose Style
House is all the rage in Brazil.
Among the Atlanta Style House’s stable of
talent is designer John Gidding, the precocious
star of HGTV’s Designed to Sell and Drawn
to Perfection. Gidding grew up in Turkey, was
educated in Switzerland, came to the U.S.
for college at Yale and went on to Harvard
Graduate School of Design. When he moved
to Atlanta last year, Artefacto was the first store
he visited. “I was impressed because they have
a contemporary line but use natural, familiar
materials,” he says. “I jumped at the opportunity
to create a 1,000-square-foot loft.”
His magnificent “Metroluxe” loft now takes
center stage, literally and figuratively, with four
richly textured rooms in varying shades of silver
gray accented in vibrant paprika. Gidding says he
is a big fan of shaping space, and he delivers on that
notion with a textural curving wall dressed in soft
cream and brown Argentinean leather and cow
hide Pampa tiles that transition guests physically
and visually from the living room to the bedroom
and bath. The reverse side of the wall is finished
in layers of marine-grade plywood that undulates
toward the shower. The natural wood juxtaposes
sleek Cuba mirrors in a silver finish and black
glass mosaic tiles that flow from the shower floor
to the bedroom where two evocative black leather
headboards are stacked vertically with a theatrical
beam of light focused between. The glossy
galley kitchen by SieMatic with state-of-the-art
Gaggenau appliances is softened by a roughhewn dining table and traditional armchairs
continued...
upholstered in lustrous silk.
DESIGNER DENS Clockwise from top left: An outdoor living room
by Rick Bonner and Rina Andrejev gets posh indoor treatment
with silks, sheers, modern art and moulded side chairs lit from
within. The pair pose on Artefacto’s hooded chaises. Michael
Habachy’s modern French Le Salon des Fumeurs is trés sultry.
...continued
But Gidding is not the only
designer with a flair for the dramatic. Michael
Habachy used his space as a platform for
artistic expression and created a dark and
daring, jet and emerald green 1940’s smoking
lair complete with ebony damask wallpaper,
a black silk Hatria sofa and art by Amy
Rader that depicts a glamorous actress with a
cigarette. (Look closely at the painting to see
two nude female bodies entwined in smoke.)
Before he even conceptualized the whole
interior, Habachy picked a pair of black pony
hide club chairs. “Furniture does not get any
sexier, and I just knew that I had to have them
in my space,” he says. “Th is was an opportunity
for me to take a risk and show that black can
be formal, risqué and sophisticated.”
Haitham Haddad would likely agree. His
“Capsule 5” is the ultimate media room enveloping
visitors with touchable black walls and ceiling
panels and inviting them to relax into a sunken
midnight-colored Conrad sectional sofa.
Wertz chose black and white as the palette
for his 500-square-foot living room. “Having
access to Artefacto’s range of beautiful pieces
was like being a kid in a candy store,” he says.
He anchored his space around a delicious white
Pravda leather sectional sofa paired with Levive
lounge chairs that are covered in tasteful black
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silk and contrasted by chrome-based white
crocodile benches, but it is his commitment
to artifacts and art that give the room a sense
of global authenticity. A grouping of ankle
bracelets from the Congo is reinterpreted as
a chandelier. Zulu hats made from human
hair punctuate a charcoal wall. Meanwhile, a
massive mixed media work by Radcliffe Bailey
and Kevin Archer’s “Drawing Series,” a sizeable
diptych painstakingly created using a marker,
establish a contemporary context.
Designer Robert Spiotta also does an
impressive job of mixing the historic with the
contemporary in his Ralph Lauren-meetsloft Urban Stable bedroom. Here walls are
treated to a multi-colored application of legacy
wood salvaged from Atlanta’s National Pencil
Company, and a huge equestrian painting by
Marily Borglum Hageman dominates one wall.
Many of the Style House designers
applaud Artefacto’s commitment to marrying
contemporary lines with environmentally friendly
materials like woods that have been certified
and approved for use by IBAMA (the Brazilian
Environment Department), but Rick Anthony
Bonner Interiors takes “green” a step further with
their living wall. It’s made of lush green plants
and comes complete with chirping crickets that
truly lend a sense of nature to an outdoor living
room as sumptuous as any interior. Custom
canopies shield weather-hearty, LED light-up
white furniture and a Bahama sofa in synthetic
cotton. Leather and silk accents kick up the
luxe factor. A three-dimensional sculpture
made of reclaimed tires by Chakaia Booker
is suspended over a stainless steel, mirrored
credenza. “We fell in love with her work
because it is in sync with Artefacto’s ecological
conscience as well as our own,” says Bonner.
For modern design aficionados, Artefacto’s
Style House is an idea whose time has come,
and because the Style House is on display for
an entire year, you can expect the designers to
keep it fresh by making seasonal changes to
their environments. Next year, look forward
to more original interpretations by a whole
new roster of talented interior designers and
architects. Meanwhile, Artefacto Vice President
Kimberly McNatt says numerous events are
in the works with the designers headlining
educational programs, trunk shows, design
advice symposiums, panels and more. You can
even invite your grandmother. A
Th e Style House is free of charge and is open
to the public seven days a week at Artefacto’s
showroom, 3050 Peachtree Road, 404.926.0004
or www.artefacto.com.