I’ve lived with this same treatment for about five years now, but it struck me coming in over the weekend what a typically New York tableau this is—the bold pattern on the wall, my clodhoppers, a glimpse of my portrait gallery and then a dirty old bike in front of it all. And I’m not changing a thing on this wall as long as I live here.

Just so you know—this is the teensiest studio in prognostication. One enters the scenario from camera left. The wall is one of my earlier “retro patterns.” Oh, all right, I stole it directly form Ornamenta, and I’ve since decided it’s better to design my own creations rather than expropriate things outright, though I did come up with the border on top. But i just had to have that experience. The paintings are by my great grandfather ca. 1900. The bike was manufactured for British mailmen in the 1960s, and a very interesting subset of people stop me on the street and say, “That thing is smokin’.”

What I liked about the pattern in the first place when I discovered it in a magazine was that it, I thought, was redolent of Italian design in the 1950s, but what do I know. Colors were Ralph Lauren Galvanized, with pearly Liquid Mercury over it. Goodness, I was young then. I close with a shot of all the blossoms in my garden, including a Tiepolo ceiling, plus my Monet bathroom.

COLORS USED:
Ralph Lauren Galvanized UL12
Benjamin Moore Liquid Mercury

- Mark Chamberlain, interior and decorative painter
Markchamberlainpainting.com