On Light, and Italian Villas
Notes from a recent site visit to a 17th-century villa outside Lucca — on shadows, shutters, and the discipline of a north-facing room.
There is a room in the villa we visited last month — a long, north-facing salon with a single, west-facing window at its end — that has more to teach about interior design than any number of glossy magazines.
The light at 4pm, when the shutters are half-drawn, is the color of weak tea. The plaster, which has been painted nineteen times in three centuries, has a depth that no new wall can imitate. And the chair — an early-19th-century gondolier's chair, painted green, and clearly used by every generation since — has a wornness that is more luxurious than any new upholstery could be.
Further reading.
The Patience of Patina
On why we never specify a brand-new surface when an aged one will do — and the slow art of letting a room find its own finish.
An Argument for the Archive
Why we keep a wall of every material we have ever specified, and what it teaches us about restraint.