apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

omg i want to throw up-- it's the most beautifully edited, stark yet warm classic gorgeous home ive ever seen. gag.

Very much in the Dutch/Belgian design vein. (The designer is married to a Dutchman, and lives & works mostly in Amsterdam). Wish we saw more of their (i.e., Belgian/Dutch) designs here...

simply lovely.

I'm in love...

Wonderful. I have to think about the sea shell mirror frame though.

I love the starkness of black and white warmed up with texture and the natural, less stark version of those neutral tones - as in the bone white of shells and the greenish-black of slate. If this house was filled with glass and steel furniture instead of roughhewn wood and wicker, it wouldn't feel like a home; this is the perfect mix. It's exactly what I tried to do with my own living and dining room, except I could never keep it this empty!

It's light and open and looks sharp, but I find it very cold. I could never live there.

What they have done is destroyed a 17th century French manor house.

I love the French manor. I would have to dazzle it up a bit though. I would change out the floors for a black wood. I hate tiled floors unless they are in a bath or kitchen (even there I'd prefer wood, marble or concrete, etc.

Her other works are just as amazing though but the most standout-ish and fabulous is by far the "a museum in Holland" which is actually a home. It is simply fab. I wouldn't change a thing!

I think Kate Hume should be placed under house arrest to prevent her from roaming Europe and desecrating the interiors of venerable old buildings. Take off the blindfold and where are you? A beautiful Jungenstil building in Prague? A 17th C manor house in the Languedoc? The hanging lamps in the Moscow apartment might faintly hint that the location's Eastern Europe. . . .

Sometimes I visit a friend in Southern France who bought a ducal keep in the 70s for about 28K. The place was originally built in the 5th C (that basement remains) and rebuilt or added onto until the 14th C. We think the fireplace in "my" bedroom is part of the original building; sometime at night flakes of plaster snow down on the sleeper; the kitchen sink was salvaged from an ancient village in the nearby valley that was flooded to form a reservoir. And so on and so forth. I think this friend would shoot Kate Hume between the eyes before he'd let her anywhere near the building!

A little respect for history, please! Let Kate loose in apartments of the housing projects in Kreislowski's Warsaw or in the high-rise housing projects outside Paris or Dublin. . . .

Boy, did this hit a nerve. I'm sorry if I'm offending anyone, really----

The fireplace might be a part of the original building, but fireplaces were quite new in the 14thc and would have been really unusual for a room meant for sleeping in.

And I totally agree about locking that woman up. Sheesh. It may have been one of those French houses where only the shell was left--I certainly hope so--but to put such a banal interior into such a gorgeous home is a crime, no matter what, and is grossly insensitive to the location.

Auliare--
What would you like to have done to homes where the ravages of time and the insensitive mangling of others has yielded a shell with little or no original detail? Tear it down?

I love the look here, and would argue that original character (and a European vibe) still resides in these lust-worthy interiors.

I wonder what Aulaire wears when she visits this ancient home. Period dress? What do they cook on? Is there electricity in the home? I think you can respect the ancient while bringing a home, meant to be lived in by people of this century, up to date w/o violating the place. Homes that are not brought up to date are frequently called 'museums'.

I have to agree with Mason above.

Aulaire,

I agree with you 100%. I am soooo tired of hearing that newer is better.

Believe it or not, you can still install electricity and wiring etc without then destroying everything that even hints at old.

As I said in my original post, they destroyed an 17th French manor house.

And how do you have ANY idea what condition the house was in originally?

it is an absolute crime - that people don't like this design. it is clean, simple and beautiful.

the world has enough bad louis the whatever'th furniture. another dollhouse based on 400 year old archaic design principles is the last thing europe (or anywhere else) needs.

should we then also argue that because the house didn't originally have indoor plumbing that they should have to do their business in a shed in the back? or in chamberpots?

since i live in an east village tenament, should i be forced to furnish it with furniture from that period and move the bathtub back into the kitchen?

this is where someone lives, and for others to deride her for making this home her own is uncalled for.

i very often bite my tongue at other posters' choices of awful furniture and tasteless design.

i may not like it, but i refrain from criticising.

but maybe now the not-so-stylish members of this community have opened the gates for me to speak my mind about porcelain cat collections, ugly furnishings, laying rugs over carpet, etc.

i'm just sayin'.

I have to agree with Aulaire and August1. What was done to that Manor House basically amounts to desecration. When I looked at the pictures I couldn't help but feel a sense of loss.

However, if the owner was staunchly modernist and determined to do this then nothing could be done to stop them. We really don't know whether (or how many times) the design firm may have tried to change the owner's mind.

What I can say is that I bear no resentment against Kate Hume because Kate Hume at least desecrated it beautifully .

"Auliare--
What would you like to have done to homes where the ravages of time and the insensitive mangling of others has yielded a shell with little or no original detail? Tear it down?"

Ah, you've brought up another subject here, Patrick. I didn't say one word about ravaged shells. I didn't think I needed to, since the Jungenstil building and French manor both look to be in pretty good original shape--or perhaps they've been restored faithfully to the originals.

I didn't say either that I dislike Hume's style: I said I disliked her disregard for the integrity of the buildings and of the period they were built in--and nothing else. I also said it hit a nerve and apologized in advance if I offended anyone: my tone was a bit--um--"spirited," which is why.

I would never write a comment blasting someone's home either, Kelton. Kate Hume is a business, though.