Mid-Century Modern Beach House
Rottingdean, East Sussex
A warm, welcoming and effortlessly cool seaside family home
Situated in a superb location, with far-reaching sea views, and within a stone’s throw from the South Downs, this expansive new-build family home had great bones, but had been finished only to a basic standard. The house was in need of an incredible interior to match its outstanding positioning. Our client engaged our full interior design service to bring the house to life, integrate contemporary features and touches, substantially increase the storage available, and reconfigure the ground floor to allow for better zoning. In addition to this, the house was in dire need of an injection of our client’s vibrant personality, and love of mid-century modern furniture pieces and artwork, with regard to decorating, furniture, rugs, joinery, fabrics, decorative lighting, accessories and artwork.
Our brief was to create an aspirational home that feels luxurious, creative, impactful and functional, utilising the available rooms efficiently, whilst injecting some much needed colour and personality, and not compromising on its open, light and airy feeling. Our client, whilst clear in her brief that some of her existing treasured mid-century pieces needed to be incorporated, was really happy to have her boundaries pushed – this is ideal in terms of creating successful interior design that both fits the brief, and provides something truly spectacular, that she may not have considered.
Clever storage solutions for an epic wardrobe and record collection
Meticulously designed
A big part of our brief for this project was bespoke joinery design. Our concept explored the idea of breaking up the expansive open-plan living area by creating a dual aspect joinery wall, encompassing a bio ethanol fireplace on one side, and the TV on the other in order to separate the snug area from the living room. Not only this, but our clients had an impressive collection of fabulous dresses and shoes, as well as records, decks and other music equipment… all of which needed a home. Our Senior Interior Architectural Designer meticulously designed bespoke storage solutions for every room in the house, liaising with the client at every stage about what she needed to store, and where.
The kitchen was custom designed completely from scratch by Pfeiffer Design too, and built by our fabulous joiners. We utilised conceptual imagery, detailed design plan drawings and elevations and photo-realistic 3D renders to bring the kitchen to life – allowing our client a snapshot of the finished result, for full sign off before it went into manufacture right here in Sussex.
A touch of mid-century modern
Artwork & Furniture Icons
Often our clients move into new homes and want to completely start again with furniture and accessories, which – while a great opportunity – wasn’t the case in this project. Our client had a fabulous collection of mid-century modern design icons and a seriously impressive Murano glass collection, including a chandelier. The existing neutral colour scheme of the house spoke to a wider aesthetic that did not reflect her colourful personality.
Whilst we didn’t make any structural changes, we decorated the house throughout – zoning the space and introducing new colours and wall-coverings to add texture, colour and personality. Understanding how the family wanted to live and entertain in the home formed a key aspect of our brief. Our Senior Designer got to know our client on a personal level, and was therefore able to detail exactly how to design the interior in line with her vision for a ’functional and luxurious’ home, with dimension and practicality at the forefront.
