There are but a few people worldwide at the very top of the
Interior Design profession. Masters of their craft whose clients are in the 1% and
whose expectations far surpass many of ours and so it is with great delight for
me to bring you one of my favorite colleagues in the field, London-based and sinfully
talented David Collins.
To some David is better known for his hospitality projects
in London like the Artesian Bar at the Langham; the Blue Bar at The Berkeley
and The Wolseley on Picadilly. He has
also done the interiors for The London NYC and West Hollywood hotels and The
Charles, a small complex of 45 coveted residences in Manhattan’s Upper East
side.
But my all-time favorite are his single project private
residences, those bastions of exquisite beauty, sybaritic luxury and devilish perfection
that sit behind closed doors and which only but a few people get to see. Lucky
for us, today we have 2.
Above is the contemporary living room of a family home in
London. It’s a melodic symphony of
colors, shapes and textures tastefully styled to perfection. Take a close look at the architecture details
and the overall balance of the room … the artwork in the background plays off
the black striated marble table in the foreground; the rectilinear fireplace
with the square, shagreen-backed club chairs; the sofa on the right with the 2
exact “mini me” versions on the left, the lamps in the back and left with the
ones in the front and right. The touch
of orange on the luxurious leather chair serves to slightly throw off the perfect
balance of the room.
The immediate image above and all the ones below correspond
to a family home in Bangkok. You can see
why David is at the forefront of luxury interiors with these images. The interior of the home is tastefully
extravagant but far from vulgar. The
entrance, with its cacophony of patterns and shapes found in the chandelier,
floor and curved sliding doors is absolutely brilliant.
And I love this library/sitting room just off the
vestibule. The pattern of the floor and
the coloring is classic yet everything in the room feels modern and very
“today”.
This is one end of the larger sitting room with the kitchen
beyond. The blue on blue flame-stitch
upholstery on the demi-lune club chair is awesome. Talk about bringing a 17th century pattern
into the 21st!
In looking at this luxurious living room three things strike
me about David’s work. First, is that he
has a keen sense of balance and proportion, which makes the rooms easy to live
in. Second, in these rooms he uses white
as the neutral priming for his canvas and brings color into the space with the
furnishing, design and artwork. Third,
he LOVES pattern. Look above, for example,
at the rug, wood floor, textured wall over the chimney and batik-printed
curtains. They all represent rectangles
of one size or another which serve as the glue that gives the space it’s
cohesive total. Of course, all of this
is much easier said than done and that’s why David Collins IS the ultimate
Master of the craft.
image credits: (top-London home) David Collins Studio,
London; (all others-Bangkok home) Richard Powers for David Collins Studio. A
Thank You to his Studio for facilitating the images.
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