{"id":14985,"date":"2022-09-30T09:30:32","date_gmt":"2022-09-30T07:30:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.homesandantiques.com\/?p=35170"},"modified":"2022-09-30T09:44:12","modified_gmt":"2022-09-30T07:44:12","slug":"a-colourful-loft-apartment-in-new-york","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/homesantiques\/rss_feed\/a-colourful-loft-apartment-in-new-york\/","title":{"rendered":"A colourful loft apartment in New York"},"content":{"rendered":"

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By Janet Gleeson\n \t\t<\/p>

Published: Friday, 30 September 2022 at 12:00 am<\/p>

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The elevator door to Brenda Cullerton\u2019s home opens to reveal a kaleidoscopically colourful apartment, with more than a splash of theatricality in its arrangement. \u2018A home doesn\u2019t just tell a story, it tells a truth. It should be somewhere you feel safe enough to take risks,\u2019 says Brenda, who is a writer and stand-up comic, and clearly a woman of her word. \u2018I detest beige,\u2019 she continues, explaining her attraction to vibrant hues, strong pattern, the beautiful and the unexpected. \u2018Some people look and ask, \u201cHow did you dare?\u201d and I always laugh because picking a colour isn\u2019t like falling in love. If it doesn\u2019t work out, changing it isn\u2019t a major drama.\u2019<\/p>\n

Brenda and her husband bought their second-floor loft apartment some 34 years ago. It\u2019s two blocks from Union Square, with its busy market, in a lively part of downtown Manhattan that she has always loved. She thinks the block started out as a piano factory and her apartment was once the showroom. When the couple moved in, their loft had already been converted to basic accommodation by two artists. \u2018We didn\u2019t do a huge renovation or build lots of walls. We left it \u2018old school\u2019, so the bare bones of the building remain, because we loved the high barrel-vaulted ceiling and the open feel of the space.\u2019<\/p>\n

But with two small children, there had to be some semblance of privacy. The front became the adult area, and they divided the back in a way Brenda describes as \u2018sort of theatrical\u2019. It\u2019s a small separate living space with three cell-like bedrooms, entered through glazed, curtained doors, so the light filters in. These days the large open area at the front has white walls and a white painted floor, \u2018which is heaven, but it does require an awful lot of mopping and scrubbing\u2019.<\/p>\n

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Within this frame are an eclectic assortment of unusual and opulently colourful furnishings that Brenda has bought from local dealers and flea markets, at antiques fairs and while on her travels. \u2018The colours reflect the wild side of me. I suppose they make people think I\u2019m utterly fearless, although, to be absolutely honest, there was no great plan, they are just the colours I love, and the space, above all, is animated by the people living in it,\u2019 she says.<\/p>\n

She started with the Caucasian carpet in the centre of the living room. \u2018Edgar Allan Poe wrote an essay called The Philosophy of Furniture in which he says the carpet is the soul of the apartment, and I think that\u2019s so true.\u2019 The rug came from an Armenian dealer she had befriended in downtown 5th Avenue. \u2018In those days the area was full of carpet dealers who had settled in the US in the 1920s. His shop was a magical place and I often used to talk about history with him.\u2019 The rug\u2019s colourful patterns, all knotted from naturally dyed wool, still fill her with joy. \u2018It was one of the mistakes I didn\u2019t make. An impulse purchase. I saw it, loved it and had to have it.\u2019<\/p>\n

Dominating the room are three tall windows that punctuate one wall and flood the room with light. \u2018The way they pivot across and open up reminds me of an ocean liner. When they\u2019re open there\u2019s a perspective of New York that most city apartments don\u2019t have,\u2019 says Brenda. She has decked them in vividly striped silk blinds. The fabric was an extravagance, but one she\u2019s never regretted. \u2018I\u2019m obsessed with stripes and polka dots, and I read an article about silk from Lyon. There is something that is so alive and rich and flamboyant about these stripes; they set the tone for everything.\u2019<\/p>\n

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Brenda\u2019s love of travel and fascination for the world around her echoes in many of the objects on display. \u2018I think it\u2019s important to live in as wide a world as you can make it, and a lot of the apartment reflects that.\u2019 In front of the central window hangs a multicoloured glass lantern from Aleppo, which the couple visited in the 90s, and she remembers as one of the most extraordinary places she\u2019s ever seen. She bought an intricate glass mosaic panel at the same time. \u2018It\u2019s part of a ceiling in an interior courtyard. This is just a small piece; imagine how glorious that would have been.\u2019<\/p>\n

In unexpected contrast to the light openness of the living area, her bedroom at the back is painted a colour she dubs \u2018Prince Purple\u2019 and a shade of heather. This is an intimate, cocoon-like space, with darker stripes painted on the window recesses, inspired by those she saw in Russian Orthodox churches. \u2018I love the feeling of being enclosed,\u2019 she says. The bathroom is similarly quirky. \u2018There\u2019s no jacuzzi. It\u2019s not a bathroom with a lot of real-estate value, but I love the look of lacquer, so I painted the floor glossy black and the ceiling fire-engine red.\u2019<\/p>\n

One of Brenda\u2019s most treasured possessions is the model carousel that stands in a corner of the living room. \u2018I bought it in the days when they used to have antiques fairs on the docks whenever ships came in. It was the end of the day, and a dealer from Montana didn\u2019t want to take it home with him. For years, when the children still lived here, it used to have fairy lights around the top, which twinkled as it turned. I have no idea what its original purpose was but, to me, it\u2019s a whimsical reminder that life is like a carousel.\u2019<\/p>\n