Interior designer Marianne Evennou, our French doyenne of color, composition, and small-space living, has just published her first book.
Un Intérieur à Soi (loose translation: “A Place of One’s Own”) is a compendium of her signature moves—interior windows, exposed beams, duo-toned walls, bonbon box-sized kitchens, and black Bakelite light switches—that dazzle us over and over.
Marianne may have go-to design tricks but she applies them with a freshness and excitement every time. Today, we’re spotlighting a favorite Paris apartment for a client named Sabine, an artist and businesswoman in her forties who Marianne describes as having “une idée à la minute.” At each of their preliminary meetings, Sabine arrived with macarons from Ladurée and their “soft but not cutesy colors: pale pink, almond green, and pastel blue” became the starting point for the makeover: “luxurious and carefree,” it’s also a pocket apartment that, as Marianne puts it, “has all the big stuff.” Join us for a tour.
Photography by Grégory Timsit, courtesy of Éditions de La Martinière.
Above: Set in an 18th century building in the Marais, the 35-square-meter (approximately 376-square-foot) apartment was completely reorganized: “we removed all the small, dark rooms to open the kitchen and bedroom to the living room thanks to interior windows.”
The entry, shown here, has a wainscot patterned with Antoinette Poisson Buisson de Roses wallpaper and a bleached parquet floor with radiant heat. Marianne puts tight quarters to work: the pink tiled floor defines the kitchen, and the bedroom is on the other side of the glazed wall. Scroll to the end for the updated floor plan.
Above: A triptych collage by artist Franck Evennou, Marianne’s husband and a frequent contributor to her projects, hangs over a linen-upholstered bench with a pleated skirt. The apartment’s “underpinning of black,” Marianne says, keeps it from “falling into sentimentality.” Serax makes the low steel Black Coffee Tables.,
Above: The two-color walls are painted in a gray called Bauhaus and Léger Cumulus, a pale blue, both from Ressource, a French line with a showroom in New York’s D&D Building. Marianne describes the Antoinette Poisson wallpaper and fabric, including these Cologne linen cushions, as having “a revisited 18th century spirit.” In the US, John Derian carries the company’s designs.
Above: Full-length curtains of a heavy Pierre Frey linen called Craft (in Armande edged in black) frame French doors that open to a window box planted with moss and ferns.
Above: A half-glazed wall divides the kitchen from the dining area. The painting is by Franck Evennou. Note the black light switches by THPG of Germany.,
Above: The dining table, a Finnish classic by Ilmari Tapiovaara, and the 1940s Polish chair by Wladyslaw Wincze and Olgierd Szlekys were sourced from online vintage marketplace Selency. The fabric globe light is one of a pair from Paris concept store Mona Market.
Above: Marianne designed the kitchen’s carpet of “candy pink” Mosaic del Sur cement tiles. Just right for a solo occupant who often eats out, the space has a compact oven by Candy over a tiny fridge.
Above: Marble counters rise to form a ledge. The walls with built-in shelves are painted in a powder pink from Ressource.
Above: “Even if it has no window to the outside, this room still has a view,” says Marianne of the lone bedroom, which has pale blue linen curtains should Sabine want to enclose the space.,
Above: A pastel apartment doesn’t require a frilly bed: Marianne layered it in a black and white gridwork. The two-armed ceiling light is by Remodelista favorite Wo & Wé.
Above: The bedroom opens to Sabine’s dressing area (with two wardrobes) and bathroom, unified by the same custom tiles that set off the kitchen.
Above: Mosaic del Sur zelliges and pink trellis-patterned tiles are “soberly balanced by black,” notes Marianne. The snake-patterned eau-de-toilette is from Officine Universelle Buly.
Floor Plan
Above: Marianne’s approach to tiny apartment living:”I design each space like a tailor-made garment” and “never neglect the smallest square centimeter.”
The Book
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Above: Un Intérieur à Soi, €38, is available from publisher Éditions de La Martinière and booksellers throughout Europe.
Follow Marianne on Instagram @marianneevennou.
Three more Marianne Evennou projects:
- The Ultimate Starter Apartment in Paris
- An Inventive, Postage Stamp-Sized Apartment in the Center of Paris
- 12 Small-Space Design Ideas for Compact Quarters
