{"id":2756,"date":"2025-02-25T15:16:09","date_gmt":"2025-02-25T07:16:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/homeofmaterials.com\/2025\/02\/25\/required-reading-retrouvius-designing-houses-from-a-philosophy-of-reuse\/"},"modified":"2025-02-25T15:16:09","modified_gmt":"2025-02-25T07:16:09","slug":"required-reading-retrouvius-designing-houses-from-a-philosophy-of-reuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/homeofmaterials.com\/th\/required-reading-retrouvius-designing-houses-from-a-philosophy-of-reuse\/","title":{"rendered":"\u0e2b\u0e19\u0e31\u0e07\u0e2a\u0e37\u0e2d\u0e17\u0e35\u0e48\u0e15\u0e49\u0e2d\u0e07\u0e2d\u0e48\u0e32\u0e19: Retrouvius, \u0e01\u0e32\u0e23\u0e2d\u0e2d\u0e01\u0e41\u0e1a\u0e1a\u0e1a\u0e49\u0e32\u0e19\u0e08\u0e32\u0e01\u0e1b\u0e23\u0e31\u0e0a\u0e0d\u0e32\u0e41\u0e2b\u0e48\u0e07\u0e01\u0e32\u0e23\u0e19\u0e33\u0e01\u0e25\u0e31\u0e1a\u0e21\u0e32\u0e43\u0e0a\u0e49\u0e43\u0e2b\u0e21\u0e48"},"content":{"rendered":"

Retrouvius is Maria Speake and Adam Hills\u2019s combination salvage business and design studio: they lead by example and we\u2019ve been drawing inspiration from them for years. The couple met as architecture students in Glasgow in the early 1990s and, after witnessing many of the city\u2019s historic structures being felled, they found their calling. \u201cWe just couldn\u2019t believe we were seeing materials and building components of significant value routinely discarded,\u201d writes Maria.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve since settled in London where they rescue historic elements\u2014materials, furniture, lighting, and fixtures, from Art Deco mirrored paneling to wooden cigar molds. While Adam hunts down their offerings, Maria and her team take on design commissions in which they incorporate resuscitated pieces.<\/p>\n

Retrouvius<\/em>, Maria\u2019s just-published book, is a compendium of these house projects. Clients include Helena Bonham Carter, who penned the foreword (\u201cI remember being in Guy and Natasha Hill\u2019s home and thinking, \u2018Oh, that\u2019s what I need, a museum cabinet to cover my dishwasher,\u201d writes Helena by way of explaining how she came to hire Retrouvius). \u201cOur mission has become to enable and inspire re-use, not just as a design preference, but as an attitude,\u201d explains Maria. \u201cResponsibility, resourcefulness, respect, and repair\u2014aren\u2019t these qualities more valuable today than ever?\u201d The White House would do well to take note.<\/p>\n

Photography courtesy of Retrouvius and Rizzoli, from Retrouvius: Contemporary Salvage: Designing Homes from a Philosophy of Re-Use<\/em>, as credited.<\/p>\n


Above: Not every room requires a lot: this North London living room retained its original wooden floors and window shutters. Maria cloaked it in Marrakesh pink and added a vintage kanthe quilt to the owner\u2019s own sofa. Photograph by Michael Sinclair.
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Above: \u201cWe used a palette of limewash paint colors throughout the house, inspired by the local environment: heather, kelp, seaweed, cold-water coral, and lichen,\u201d writes Maria of Rodel House, a 1781 harborside manse in the Outer Hebrides that had been \u201cstripped and denuded\u201d of its history, until Retrouvius arrived. Photograph by Simon Upton.
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Above: Richly veined marble and a band of wooden cigar molds add pattern and texture to the new kitchen of a North London townhouse. \u201cRe-used materials have a tactile personality, carrying memories and feeling that root us in something real,\u201d writes Maria. \u201cThe true value of materials and design, however, lies not just in their novelty, but in their capacity to evolve and endure.\u201d Photograph by Michael Sinclair.
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Above: Fashion designer Bella Freud, another contributor to the book, commissioned Retrouvius to build her London hideaway. It\u2019s arrayed around a central \u201ccourtyard\u201d with a green carpet and features interior steel windows saved from the Battersea Power Station. The slouchy leather armchair belonged to Bella\u2019s father, artist Lucian Freud\u2014that\u2019s his painting cart next to it. Photograph by Michael Sinclair.,

Above: Salvage isn\u2019t the only answer for Maria: after failing to source a vintage Pucci rug sized right for an Italian client\u2019s bedroom in Hampstead, she contacted the design house directly. Permission was granted for \u201ca bespoke colorway to be made from an archival Pucci design\u2026a wild mix of funky and punky colors.\u201d The flower-shaped glass ceiling light is a Retrouvius special. Photograph by Tom Fallon.
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Above: Checked handmade paper patterns the walls and ceiling of a guest bath with bright wainscotting and layered vintage rugs in a centuries-old house in Dartmoor, England. Photograph by Theo Tennant.
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\nRetrouvius<\/em> is available from booksellers all over. On the cover: a Notting Hill sitting room with a 17th-century stone fireplace salvaged from a house in Somerset: see the project in A Rustic Townhouse Remodel by London\u2019s Masters of Salvage. Photograph by Kim Lightbody. <\/p>\n

More Retrouvius remodels:<\/p>\n