The same paint – ‘Stony Ground’ by Farrow & Ball – has been used on all the walls on the lower floor. Vintage pieces add to the mix, such as a handful of mid-century ceramic vessels displayed on the shelves and a Seventies wall-mounted sculpture, which was bought from antique dealer Dorian Caffot de Fawes, above the Jamb chimneypiece. ‘I didn’t want the shelving to feel heavy or dominating,’ she says. Her solution was floating wood and bronze shelves made bespoke by Porada, which sit lightly in front of one of the windows. However, this did present Jessie with a challenge when it came to finding a place to position the television. This room is filled with light, as two of its walls are actually floor-to-ceiling windows. Next to this, MDF panels concealing electrical equipment were swapped for embossed leather panels, introducing more interesting texture. ‘It was a long process to get it approved by the freeholder, but it transforms the space and gives it a focal point,’ she says. Her most significant intervention was in the sitting and dining room, where she added a black marble Jamb chimneypiece. With the bones in place, Jessie’s efforts were mainly focused on sourcing pieces that would bring a richness to the interior.
The parquet floors stayed put, too, as did the wood and glass staircase. ‘It felt a total waste to rip these out, as they are quite pretty and subtle,’ says Jessie, pointing out the onyx splashback in the kitchen. The layout worked well, as did the design of the kitchen and the bathrooms, which had been installed by the developer. The flat – her first London project – is accessed from the first floor, and is spread across two floors, with an open-plan sitting and dining room and a kitchen on the entrance floor, and two bedrooms with en-suite bathrooms upstairs.
‘We wanted to make it comfortable while staying true to its new-build roots, striking a balance between contemporary and traditional.’ ‘We didn’t want it to feel like a brand new flat.’ She had already worked on two of the owner’s homes – a house in the Bahamas and an apartment in Manhattan – so had a good grasp of what he liked and he, in turn, gave her carte blanche. ‘Our challenge was to get away from the feeling of a white box and give it personality,’ says Jessica, known as Jessie, who began work on the project in 2019. What do you do if you are a transatlantic businessman who visits London a few times a year and would prefer to have your own pied-à-terre rather than stay in a hotel? If you are the Bahamian owner of this flat, you buy a two-bedroom maisonette in a new 15-storey development in the heart of Marylebone and call on Manhattan-based designer Jessica Schuster to work her magic.