Hauvette & Madani have brought their signature understated palette to the first apartment for a young couple in the fashionable Marais district of Paris. The space itself was quite special with a superbly high ceiling and a luminosity not often seen in this type of property.

Samantha Hauvette and Lucas Madani have been undertaking a number of residential and commercial projects in Paris, and in turn have taken the city by storm. Having met on the benches of the prestigious Camondo school, the duo have been working together ever since. Complementary in their timeless approach to design, from the conception of space to furniture design, they sign elegant and refined interiors, tinged with the patina of modernism and this apartment, while on the smaller side is no different.

The original loft apartment consisted of the main area offering a meagre 40sqm and a large mezzanine of 20sqm—accessed by a small ladder. Immediately, the architects pinpointed this mezzanine level as the key to the project. With this as the starting point, it was deemed crucial to give real “value” to this level, considering it was intended to be the bedroom.

It was therefore necessary to meticulously work on its access, made all the more complicated as the structure of the apparent framework left only very few possibilities. With these constraints at play, a solid oak staircase, organic in nature was constructed.

“We liked the idea of a dramatic central element, in a small space, which allowed us to distance the different living spaces—living room, dining room and kitchen—without partitioning and losing luminosity or feeling of space,” elaborate Samantha and Lucas.

Understated as always, their familiar palette reveals itself in a new and unique way. Rich, lacquered wood details are balanced with a subtle marble splashback in the kitchen and cult vintage furniture sourced from Parisian design galleries. Samantha and Lucas also thought of a linear carpentry that would transition from the kitchen to the living room.

The materiality and furnishings, although reminiscent of their body of work, are also imbued with the style of their young clients. From the colourful painting by François Boisrond to the original litho of Marylin Monroe by Andy Warhol, these distinctly personal touches sit easily among the usual suspects on Hauvette & Madani’s hot list such as the Shuttered sconces by Charlotte Perriand and a travertine table with a chrome base from &Tradition.

Always surprising us with their stylish design solutions, Hauvette & Madani have completely transformed this apartment with only a minimal intervention.

[Images courtesy of Hauvette & Madani. Photography by Luca Madani.]

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