Habitually Chic®'s Logo  

One Paris Apartment Two Ways and an Auction

by habituallychic

05 . 07 . 18


I had a hard time trying to decide what to name this post because it’s actually about a few different but related things. First, Delphine and Reed Krakoff have decided to part with some of their collection of art and furniture at Sotheby’s 23 May 2018 in the sale A Collection That We Dreamt Of: Art and Design From the Homes of Delphine and Reed Krakoff. It is a play on the name of their recently published book Houses That We Dreamt Of: The Interiors of Delphine and Reed Krakoff that features the interiors of their homes in New York, East Hampton, Paris, Palm Beach, and Connecticut.

I also love following their Instagram account @delphinereedkrakoff for more photos of their homes. It was a post of the exterior of their Paris apartment that made me realize that the apartment on rue de Grenelle is located in the same hôtel particulier as the former home of Hubert de Givenchy. The Krakoff’s live in the right wing which was also the former home of Susan and John Gutfreund. The Gutfruend apartment, featured in the January/February 2011 issue of Veranda, was designed by Henri Samuel and architect Alain Reynaud and was filled with 18th-century antiques. It is a much more traditional French design than how the Krakoff’s live in the apartment now which is much more pared back but punctuated with their enviable art collection. In their book, they say their renovation was to meant to bring back many of the original details and “make the the house feel as if we had done no work at all.”

It’s sometimes hard to figure out which photos come from which Krakoff home because the art moves between them often. The Sotheby’s auction will offer pieces by Claude and François-Xavier Lalanne, Diego Giacometti, Jean Royère, Harry Bertoia, Jean-Michel Frank, Charlotte Perriand, Mattia Bonnetti and Damien Hirst, among many others. As Delphine mentions in the Sotheby’s interview, “we really believe that collecting is a transient process, which is constantly challenging our aesthetic choices. The education and experience of traveling together and pursuing new pieces remains, but we feel it’s time to let go a little.”

In advance of the Sotheby’s auction, I thought it would be fun to look at the Krakoffs Paris apartment and how it differs from the Gutreunds decor. I look forward to seeing how it changes after the major pieces are sold which I hope is chronicled on Instagram.