BELLAS ARTES

French artist, designer, and talented antique hunter Marin Montagut celebrates the joy of collecting everything from textiles to barware to architectural details, taking readers inside a dozen private homes, flea markets, and unusual ateliers to discover the most whimsical treasure troves in France. From a film prop house’s array of leather sporting goods and playing cards to a travel buff’s vintage maps and globes, and from a sculpture studio’s Grecian plaster casts to an amateur designer’s spiral staircase models, and from Montagut’s own wonder wall assemblages to a cook’s haven filled with porcelain dessert molds and copper pots—objects, when presented together as a series, create unforgettable interiors that radiate charm. Inspiration comes in repetition: wooden zigzag rulers with engraved numbers aligned on a wall in a herringbone pattern create an artful space. The spare wooden forms of capipotes—devotional statues used in religious processions, their eyes turned heavenward in ecstasy—and silver ex-votos can be the point of departure for the theme of an entire room. Montagut’s mood boards for each chapter provide endless ideas for the home.

Across small cottages and lavish villas, beach houses and forest refuges, discover the world’s finest crop of new homes. This cutting-edge global digest features such talents as Shigeru Ban and Marcio Kogan alongside up-and-coming names like Aires Mateus, Xu Fu-Min, Vo Trong Nghia, Desai Chia, and Shunri Nishizawa. Here, there are homes in Australia and New Zealand, from China and Vietnam, in the United States and Mexico, and on to less expected places like Ecuador and Costa Rica. The result is a sweeping survey of the contemporary house and a revelation that homes across the globe may have more in common than expected. Among guava trees and abandoned forts in Western India is a sanctuary designed for and by Kamal Malik of Malik Architecture. The House of Three Streams is a sprawling spectacle with high ceilings, verandas, and pavilions, perched atop a ridge overlooking two ravines. A medley of steel, glass, wood, and stone, the house weaves along the contour of the landscape, almost as an extension of the forest. Encina House by Aranguren & Gallegos, an elegant, sloping structure reminiscent of a gazebo, similarly inhabits its surrounding vista. Ensconced in a pine forest north of Madrid, the lower level is embedded in rock and connected to the upper by a natural stone wall. Shinichi Ogawa’s Seaside House is an immaculate two-story minimalist marvel in Kanagawa that overlooks the Pacific. Its living area spills onto a cantilevered terrace and infinity pool, almost dissolving into the ocean as one seamless entity. In Vietnam, Shunri Nishizawa’s House in Chau Doc exudes tropical sophistication with exposed timber beams, woven bamboo, plants, concrete panels, and inner balconies and terraces. Its corrugated iron panels act as moveable walls and shutters, ushering in views of surrounding rice fields.

Estas casas, residencias, refugios y estudios de inspiradora diversidad de estilos le sorprenderán y asombrarán sin importar cuáles sean sus preferencias en cuanto a interiorismo, tanto si prefiere una casa de campo de estilo rústico, un moderno loft neoyorkino o un bungalow bohemio. Esta meticulosa aproximación al diseño de interiores contemporáneo reúne proyectos de todo el mundo, de Auckland (Nueva Zelanda) a Aviñón (Francia). Con cientos de imágenes tomadas por reconocidos fotógrafos de interiores, estos magníficos espacios le ofrecen ideas para la próxima renovación de su vivienda. Muchas de las casas seleccionadas pertenecen a creadores (diseñadores, cineastas y coleccionistas) cuyo talento para combinar a la perfección los diferentes elementos que componen un interior sólo puede definirse como extraordinario. Su forma de conjuntar papel pintado, muebles, tejidos y obras de arte, y de equilibrar cuidadosamente colores, texturas y formas, se convierte en una auténtica expresión artística. Eclécticos o minimalistas, antiguos o ultramodernos, estos proyectos reúnen lo mejor del interiorismo contemporáneo y muestran las incontables y asombrosas posibilidades del diseño de interiores.