It began with a work of art. Interior designer Iram Sultan had fallen in love with a piece by Julien Segard and was hoping to include it in a client’s home she was working on. “I had recommended it so strongly that I had even placed it in a 3D render that I had created for them for that space,” shares the New Delhi-based designer, who sees art as an integral part of her interior design practice. “But art is so personal, and they just didn’t relate to it.” Sultan was quietly mourning the loss of the work when she was approached by another prospective client, a young couple who’d just bought two apartments in DLF’s The Camellias and converted it into a whopping 9,000-square-foot home. They also happened to have an art collection of their own, and were hoping to design a home where it could shine. Their most recent acquisition? The very same Julien Segard painting that Sultan had wanted to use in the previous project–in fact, they had seen it on her Instagram account. “Fate, serendipity, connection, call it what you may, but this project was meant to be,” Sultan beams.
Today, the Segard holds pride of place in the client’s living room, surrounded by some of the top names in the contemporary art world, plus some iconic pieces of collectible design. Right under the Segard is a DeMuro Das coffee table in pyrite that casts a speckled shadow on the ceiling in the evening light. Across the room, a retro-futuristic Draga & Aurel wall lamp is flanked by two monochromatic works, one a painted shutter by Atul Dodiya and the other a piece from Jitish Kallat’s Wind Study series. When the lamp is on, the red tones make the two works seem monochromatic, and suddenly the arrangement of peppery-cream lounge chairs and sofas, and the crumpled Ingo Maurer paper lamp, tell a whole different story. In this Gurugram apartment, design and art are in constant conversation–sometimes accentuating it, sometimes even adding a new layer to it. In the private lift lobby you’ll find Samnta Batra Mehta’s “Museum of My Mind” series suspended over a sofa that has been upholstered in a custom embroidered fabric, riffing off the silver and grey background in the very same tones. Turn to your left, and you’ll see light playing off the pastel tones of a Rana Begum sculpture, adding an almost neon tinge to a work that’s already an optical illusion in its own right. “Art is the cornerstone of our practice,” shares Sultan, “It imbues any design with soul—and it’s also such a personal expression that varies from client to client, and it helps every project be unique.”
