English designer Elsie Wilson turned her venerable Victorian mansion into a sunny island. Tissue paper on the walls, painted in sunset colors, fills the house with life-giving sunlight

Passing the gallery

Text: John Snelson, Maria Krieger

A photo: Henry Wilson

Magazine: H (54) 2001

Matisse went "for the sun" for his paintings to Algeria, Gauguin to Majorca ... The English designer Elsie Wilson went the other way: she did not leave "foggy Albion", but simply arranged a small sunny island at home "When you had known what kind of litter ..." - the Akhmatova confession remarkably characterizes the interior of this Victorian mansion. In fact, it all started with a trifle: once Elsie was presented with a glass vase. Probably, if an ordinary practical person turned out to be in the place of the artist, then this vase would remain “a vessel (of elongated shape, on the stem) for fruits, flowers” ​​(S.I. Ozhegov. “Explanatory Dictionary of the Russian Language”). In our case, the sunny-lemon coloring of colored glass, as if the sunlight itself, gave the designer the idea of ​​a house. Everything else is a matter of technique. Sunlight floods the whole house: somewhere frank and saturated, domineering, like the hot sun of the south, somewhere delicate and a little tired, the colors of a quiet sunset, it fills the space, dictating its rules of the game. The artist has embodied the main motive of the interior, his “texture” on tissue paper, which drapes the walls. The paper is colored in sunset colors: golden yellow, orange, bright pink, purple hues, against which the branches of tropical trees intricately intertwined. Glass doors lead from the garden to the bright dining room. This is where the main "theme" begins. Primary colors are deep orange and dark, thick blue on a perfectly white background. To enhance the "airiness" and contrast, the walls, chairs and even an antique German chest of the 18th century were dressed in white! Each room has its own "sound", corresponding to a common color theme. So, the kitchen and the staircase to the second floor are a benefit-show of golden yellow, here only small fragments remain from the classic white walls. Thanks to their paperiness and transparency, the walls acquire some mystical resemblance to Mayakovsky’s famous yellow jacket from the three yards of sunset. The whole room is filled with life-giving sunlight. The living room is dominated by stylistic confusion, built into a cult in the glorious era of postmodernism. A yellow Vietnamese vase from the work of the late twentieth century coexists peacefully with prim antique chairs. The role of the coffee table performs ... ironing board sample 1950, covered with a fleecy green fabric. In the bedroom of the hostess, the airy white takes revenge: coloristic accents play here rather a supporting role, giving this almost ethereal interior material weight. The number of accessories is minimized, everything is built on the combination of simple smooth lines and "open" color. According to Elsie Wilson, this room reflects her view of the ideal combination of "matter" and "air" in the room. The designer admits that in the design of the house the game with color and shape, the process of creativity was more important for her than the final result. However, in the end, the result turned out to be worthy of the “process”: the house acquired its own unique style and individuality, a special mood. The venerable Victorian mansion parted with its ostentatious seriousness and gloom.