In London, a Dramatic Blue Stairway Amps Up the Allure of An Actor’s Apartment
Patalab Architects spices up a closed-off stair room with one part natural light and another part saturated hue.
Patalab Architects spices up a closed-off stair room with one part natural light and another part saturated hue.
Los Angeles–based actor and director Satya Bhabha had a nomadic upbringing, spending time in the U.K. and India before settling in the U.S. But the one home Satya and his family have held on to since he was born is a ground-floor apartment in a Georgian terrace house in North London. The residence is "very personal to my family," he says, which is why, despite his still-peripatetic existence, Satya has kept the apartment, renting it out during his extended absences from London.
Prior to its reconfiguration by London architecture firm Patalab, the central staircase of Satya Bhabha’s Islington flat was a "weird, liminal space," he says. Now, painted in a blue from Dulux, the passageway is the sensuous heart of an otherwise spare and neutral interior. The chair is by Chase & Sorensen.
Photo by Julian Abrams
The home sits between contrasting green spaces. Highbury Fields, a bustling public park full of dog walkers and young families, is across the street from the front kitchen and living area, while in back, two bedrooms face a lush private garden that functions as "an intimate extension of the house," says Satya.
"Opening up the view from the fields to the garden changes the way the whole flat functions," Satya says. The designers used painted SLV Plastra wall lights in the stairwell and throughout the apartment.
Photo by Julian Abrams
But because of a 20th-century alteration, the bedrooms were connected to the rest of the apartment by a few steps in an awkward, small central room that complicated movement—and blocked the sight line—from front to back. To improve the flow, Satya called on London-and Berlin-based architectural practice Patalab, which replaced a section of wall in the stair room with open shelving that lets in more daylight as well as views of the surrounding greenery. That kind of transparency is typical of the Georgian period, "when you could look through a building and see the garden behind," says Patalab founder and director Uwe Schmidt-Hess.
To restore the original Georgian proportions in the living area, Patalab shortened an entry hall and repositioned the kitchen, which is illuminated at night by a 1965 pendant by Paavo Tynell. The kitchen doors, shelving, and paneling are by Hølte, while the countertop is from Stone World and flooring from Havwoods.
Photo by Julian Abrams
See the full story on Dwell.com: In London, a Dramatic Blue Stairway Amps Up the Allure of An Actor’s Apartment
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