Asian Infusion (continued)
In lower Manhattan, designer Shamir Shah created a sophisticated, understated flat for a client whose passion is modern and Asian art.
The apartment came with better-than-average kitchen appliances and bathroom fixtures, courtesy of the developer. So instead of rushing to redo the place, the homeowner decided to live for a year or so with his own furniture while figuring out what he liked and didn't like about the spaces. But when he visited a downstairs neighbor, who had hired Shamir Shah to redo his apartment, he knew he was ready to renovate. Raised in London and Paris, the client collects contemporary art, much of it from Asia, and he wanted the apartment to reflect his international perspective. Shah, who was born in Kenya to parents of Indian descent, is known for interiors that wed domestic comfort and worldly sophistication.
During a nine-month renovation, Shah left no surface untouched. He created "bespoke" details like a dining room ceiling composed of round rice-paper shades in varying sizes and heights on a bronze armature, suggesting a collection of Chinese lanterns or the stylized clouds of a Japanese woodblock print. Asked how many shades there are altogether, the owner answers 31 -- and he knows, he says, because he has to change the lightbulbs. Not that he's complaining.
Shah, he says, gave him a home that embraces the world while standing squarely in Manhattan.
Since the client eats out nearly every night, there was no great need for a formal dining room. Instead, Shah turned a 20-by-40-foot space formed by combining the living room and the apartment's third bedroom into a posh lounge (with seating for 25 and a sofa facing a TV where the dining table might have been). For a smaller dining room that the owner can use "in a pinch," Shah took over a square foyer, which he opened up by replacing a solid wall with shelves that allow sunlight to reach the once-dark space.
One room Shah planned to leave untouched was the kitchen, which had been installed by the developer only a year before. "The environmentalist in me thought it would be a horrible waste to tear everything out," he says. But when the client saw the plans for the rest of the apartment, he thought the "builder kitchen" would look cheesy alongside Shah's carefully considered interiors. He had Shah design a replacement kitchen (though, luckily for the environment, one that reused the existing appliances).
The client's informal approach to entertaining at home meant there was no need for a wall between the living room and the new kitchen; the counter serves as a bar when he has guests. At the same time, Shah wanted to make sure the kitchen didn't compete with the light-and-art-filled living room. He did that by choosing dark oak paneling for the kitchen walls and deep-green marble for its counter surfaces. He also specified reflective surfaces, including "high-gloss auto body lacquer" for the upper cabinets and ½-inch glass tiles for the backsplash. The idea was to dematerialize the kitchen, allowing it to hide in plain sight.
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