Designer breathed new life into an outdated interior, preserving items dear to the owners’ hearts. See before and after photos.
This apartment was created for a married couple – native St. Petersburg residents. Having lived in this house for 20 years, the customers realized that the interior was somewhat outdated and they needed to move on. They invited designer Alexandra Yakushenko to jointly update the decor and introduce modern techniques and bright colors into the interior. There was no specific stylistic preference – the designer relied on existing art and the wishes of the clients. For example, the owner wanted a green kitchen from the very beginning.
The apartment had its kitchen, living room and bathrooms remodeled many years ago. They pushed away from her. “I don’t really like to clearly zone space. On the contrary, I try to visually unite the rooms to create the feeling of a larger area. The entire apartment has the same parquet flooring (except for the bathrooms), the painting also unites the entrance hall, corridor (there are no doors between them and the living room), and the kitchen-dining room. The same color and wide opening create a feeling of open space, which is difficult to achieve in standard apartments,” says the designer.
The kitchen is custom made and L-shaped. The built-in refrigerator is located closer to the entrance, then there is a module for storing vegetables and a sink, a corner module, a free work surface, along the second wall there is a dishwasher, an electric stove, a large module with drawers for storing large utensils. The kitchen set is completed by a low cabinet with an oven.
“I decided to make the upper zone of the kitchen only along one of the walls, and to “unload” the view and place on it a “floating” copper-colored hood, which in itself is both decor and good household appliances. They also decided to use the space under the window sill and installed a small hanging bar there. It is painted in the same color as the walls, only the handles are made of natural green stone and emphasize the overall color palette of the interior,” says the designer.
The bar counter in the dining area is made from natural stone according to the designer’s sketches. A metal base was made especially for it. The counter is designed to visually differentiate the space for preparing food and the dining room. Lights above the counter also visually separate these areas.
The peculiarity of the interior is a combination of old and new, rare things (Boulle chest of drawers, a sofa dear to the customers’ hearts – the only thing they left from the previous furnishings) and very modern ones (electronic piano, paintings, kitchen apron). The basis is classic: moldings, herringbone parquet as a tribute to the Stalinist Empire style. The color scheme is unusual, very impressive: a malachite-colored kitchen, plum shades in furniture and frescoes, accent decor on a neutral background of the walls.
The trick is the design of the window in the music room: blinds are a housewife’s dream, evoking associations with the sea and warm countries. The window sill and the shelving underneath are made of natural wood. This family reads a lot, so the task was to arrange a fairly extensive library, part of which was located in this shelving unit, and part of it in the built-in display case in the hallway.
“The fresco in the hallway maintains the mood of the music room – there is an association with warm countries, and the shade is not lush tropical green, but stylized, plum, reminding us that we are not in the south after all. Armstrong suspended ceiling – this was practically the only technical and very strict requirement from customers, since behind it there are ventilation and alarm systems that necessarily require quick access. I found the most suitable option for everyone—paintable panels with hidden guides—and painted them the same color as the walls in order to visually “dissolve” the ceiling and not focus attention on it,” says Alexandra Yakushenko.
In the bathroom, the toilet was moved and the proportions of the niche behind the bathtub were changed – it became wider and lower, more suitable for the dimensions of the bathtub. We also made a functional hidden cabinet in the form of panels painted gray, which housed communications, a manifold cabinet and storage space for household chemicals.
Photos of the apartment before renovation:
