According to Jen Roberts, Design Miami’s chief executive, the company had been eyeing up Paris for a while but decided to commit once Art Basel announced its first fair in the city for October.
‘I can’t think of another city in the world with this level of dealers and galleries,’ says Simon Andrews
“We were sure it would all happen last year until we received a notice at the end of July to say the venue was no longer viable,” says Roberts. Partly to blame were unruly scenes following a football match, which made the police nervous about introducing more activity around a site as central as Concorde. This year, after they had looked at 48 possible locations, the Hôtel de Maisons appeared as a last-minute option. “My team said, ‘It’s a fabulous house! Don’t walk, run!’”
The house is indeed so fabulous that, from 1977 to 2007, when still under the ownership of the Pozzo di Borgo family (a name by which is sometimes known), it was home to Karl Lagerfeld. He lived there in extraordinary eclectic splendour, surrounded by historical tapestries and bronzes as well as contemporary works by Konstantin Grcic and Martin Szekely.
“It’s not going to be easy to install our pieces there,” says gallerist Jacques Lacoste, the city’s leading specialist in the haute bourgeois works of mid- century designer Jean Royère. “We can’t put anything on the walls or hang any- thing from the ceiling. But it is a mini- Versailles.” Some, though, have lucked out. “We’ve been told we’re showing in Karl’s former bedroom,” says Paul Bour- det, who runs a gallery with his partner Charlotte Ketabi. The pair specialise in 1980s French design. “For us this work, by Philippe Starck, for example, is already historic. It’s sculptural and radical, and we’re excited to show how well it fits into this uniquely Parisian decor.”
In the Hôtel de Maisons’ very large garden galleries will be able to show outdoor works, some with unique connections to the city. For Ketabi Bourdet, this means a pair of aluminium chairs designed by Starck in 1984 for the Parc de la Villette in Paris. The originals are still there, and other examples are rare. Edward Mitterrand, who is a specialist in the work of Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne, known for their large sculptural renditions of animals, will be exhibiting the latter’s “Âne attelé” (Donkey in harness), equipped with a cart-cum-planter, con- ceived in 1989 for the parc Georges- Brassens. “Les Lalannes,” says Mitterand, “have become icons of French design around the world, particularly in Asia. But I would love this piece to stay in France.”
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