Collector’s Edition

Milan is a city known for its grand residential interiors, from palazzi and 19th-century apartments to modernist villas – all of which express a highly curated approach to living. It’s this evocative expression of taste through interior design that inspired LC Atelier’s vision for a Milanese city retreat for a couple with a passion for collecting. 

“They wanted a colourful, playful but still contemporary and elegant home that would reflect their love for contemporary art and design,” explains Lucrezia Calvi, founder of LC Atelier. “So, we dove into the project understanding their heritage and that of the location we were working on.”

Rather than create a stark gallery-like interior, Calvi let the collection – most of which is from 20th-century artists – guide the design. Some works, including pieces by Lucio Fontana, Munch, Alighiero Boetti, Enrico Castellani, Frank Stella and Ai Weiwei, were already part of the couple’s collection. Others, including a piece by Marina Abramović and an Ugo Rondinone work produced specifically for them, were acquired during the renovation. 

The living room is treated as a “white canvas” against which the character of the art pieces is celebrated. More private rooms, including the kitchen, bedrooms and bathrooms, each have their own distinct personality, with colour and material palettes inspired by the artworks. Bathrooms, for example, draw inspiration from the historic Art Deco Villa Necchi Campiglio, with black-painted glass walls, Italian marble, and burnished brass details.

A white terrazzo floor runs through the apartment, visually unifying the spaces. It is laid in a regular matrix that dissolves into something different in key spaces. In the kitchen, for example, it takes on a palladiana pattern inspired by the 1930s; and in the bathrooms, it becomes a Carlo Scarpa-inspired mosaic tesserae. 

The couple’s furniture collection was used to create an intriguing dialogue between the contemporary artwork and 20th-century design. “Milan is a city full of design masters and so we decided to create a walkthrough of the stories of the Milanese designers,” says Calvi, who sourced many of the pieces at auction, from a Doge table by Carlo Scarpa and Catilina chairs by Caccia Dominioni, to Maralunga socas by Vico Magistretti.

“It’s been incredibly fulfilling and beautiful to immerse myself in this project,” she says. “The most important thing is that our clients are happy with the result, it has to feel like their own skin.”