Page 159 - home and garden

hen internationally renown-
ed landscape architect Kim
Wilkie was looking for a
London pied-à-terre, only
one location would do. ‘I’ve
always loved St James’s,’ he
says. ‘It’s the perfect part of
London. It has everything:
W the Royal Academy and the
parks, you can walk everywhere, and pretty much all my
clients have an office or a flat within five minutes of here.’
On the second floor of a large Italianate block of gentle-
men’s chambers on Jermyn Street, Kim’s flat offers all the
advantages of living in the heart of London with few of the
drawbacks. Though only a hop, skip and a jump from the
tourist-bedevilled maelstrom of Piccadilly Circus, it’s a
relatively quiet street that still retains something of its
Georgian scale and character. As we talk, the bell of
St James’s Church, Piccadilly, clearly strikes the hour.
The flat, which he bought in December 2012, is flooded
with light, thanks to five large south-facing windows, left
uncurtained apart from discreet white-linen blinds. ‘Three
things sold the place to me,’ says Kim. ‘The windows, the
proportions of the rooms and the entrance stairs.’ Those
stairs are indeed so grand in scale that Kim’s modest front
door comes as something of a surprise.
The previous owners, an elderly couple, had lived in the
flat for many years, and the place was authentically Eighties
in feel, with extravagantly swagged curtains, low false ceil-
ings and laminate floors. The vast pink sofas they left
behind had to be chopped into bits to feed them out through
the door. That it looks so different today is thanks to the
architect William Smalley, who Kim met when they worked
together on the much-discussed Chelsea Barracks scheme.
You can sense that Kim – quietly spoken, with intensely
blue eyes – is the kind of person who thrives on peace and
calm, and William has carved a series of fittingly serene
spaces out of what was once an awkward plan.
The most immediately striking component of his white-
on-white scheme is the entrance hall, with walls that slope
imperceptibly into a barrel vault overhead. Kim smiles
when he describes it as ‘very William’. The idea, William
explains, ‘came to me when I stuck my head up above the
false ceilings in the original flat and saw an arch’. Two sets
of plain openings, uncluttered by architraves, lead off
to the left into the study and the sitting room, and to the
bathroom and galley kitchen on the right. Recessed and
pocket doors add to the overall feeling of quiet simplicity.
The study, with two of the south-facing windows, also
connects directly with the sitting room, which has a door
to the en suite bedroom, tucked away overlooking a quiet
internal courtyard at the back.
‘I wanted the interior to look massive but simple at the
same time,’ William explains. ‘Almost as if it had been
carved out of a single space. The flat is also divided by two
substantial walls, and I wanted the whole design to share
that feeling of solidity and weight.’ The effect is achieved by
matching the depth of the solid walls throughout – in the
form of oak shelves in the study, for example – but also with
sturdy detailing, keeping each surface as simple as possible.

BOTH PICTURES At one end of the study, a glass-topped ‘Dublin’ desk from Habitat and a Seventies Perspex and steel chair provide a small work space; the adjacent
door leads in to the sitting room. Just behind is the original marble chimneypiece moved from the sitting room and a decorative wooden ladder by Simon Thomas

HOUSEANDGARDEN.CO.UK NOVEMBER 2015 157