THE JOURNAL
CRAFTING HISTORY
Famed for creating storied interiors for the world’s A-listers, Michael S Smith is one of the most respected talents of his generation. Charlotte Abrahams made herself comfortable and asked him to share his tale
W turning it
hen the celebrated American interior designer Michael S Smith was a boy, he flooded the back yard of his family’s California home,
into a muddy field. “I was obsessed with
all things Japanese at the time,” he says. “I slept on a mattress on my bedroom floor, ate nothing but rice with rice wine vinegar and tried to make a water garden. I didn’t realise I needed to do something to stop the water draining away.” He has learned more about both Japanese cuisine and physics in the years since, but his fascination with creating sets for living and what he calls “immersive moments” has remained.
It is the driving force in the ‘saltbox’ style house he
designed with New York City architects Ferguson & Shamamian, turning a new build into what appears to be an early Hamptons farmhouse that has been slowly extended and altered over successive generations. The main living room, for example, is crafted to look as if the original 17th- or 18th-century interior had been hollowed out, creating a soaring loft-like space for contemporary living. And it infuses the pied à terre he shares with his
husband, James Costos, in Madrid. Costos was the US ambassador
to Spain during Obama’s second presidential term and, while the couple returned to Los
OPPOSITE: An Upper East Side penthouse in New York designed for powerhouse TV producer Shonda Rhimes; the Regency mirror and chinoiserie wallpaper hint at Rhimes’ best-loved work, Bridgerton. “Michael Smith is most of all a purveyor of joy,” writes Rhimes in the foreword to a new monograph of the designer’s work. ABOVE: Smith says his style is rooted in classic English decorating
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©Michael Mundy
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