Two years in the past, Gesa Hansen might by no means have predicted that she could be dwelling in a stone cottage. “I used to be so determined to seek out an condo or home that I used to be open to something,” says the German-Danish inside designer. “I even thought of houseboats.” Ultimately, Hansen didn’t select life on the water, however she nonetheless discovered a house near a river. In 2024, she was taking a look at property within the idyllic group of Samois-sur-Seine, close by the Parisian suburbs. This was the place she noticed a two-story stone nation home sitting behind a half-timbered Belle Époque villa typical of the area. Apropos of nothing, Hansen knocked on the door to inquire in regards to the property. “The artist who lived there opened it and, to my shock, it was an outdated acquaintance,” she says.

On the time, the painter wasn’t occupied with promoting. However that quickly modified, and Hansen moved in together with her youngsters and her canine within the winter of 2024—newly divorced and at a vital tipping level in her life. That is in all probability why the inside designer, who additionally designs furnishings for her model The Hansen Household, didn’t need to settle with only some floor touch-ups to her new house. She determined as an alternative to utterly reimagine the structure of the 1,100-square-foot cottage, particularly by eradicating partitions and letting in additional mild.

Inside designer Gesa Hansen.

At the moment, the cottage is a surprising lesson in the usage of daring colours, materials, wallpapers, nautical influences, and heat supplies. All these parts add as much as a comfortable house surrounded by nature which additionally shows an intriguingly unconventional and uninhibited facet—the house’s backyard was designed by Hansen, in collaboration with Estelle Marandon. It additionally has an uncommon mixture of outdated (a sure English cottage fashion) and new (a extra wild and pure strategy, within the vein of Piet Oudolf designs.) Every part, from the home and its inside to the design of the backyard displays Hansen’s life in a time of transition. “I’ve been by means of a little bit of hell,” she says, referencing this era. “However it additionally looks like liberation.”

An sudden Bauhaus affect

From the primary second she noticed the nation home, Hansen seen its giant home windows, like these you may discover in an artist’s studio. “They remind me of the Bauhaus,” she says, referring to the varsity in Dessau, Germany, the place Hansen herself studied earlier than working for Jean Nouvel and later founding her personal studio. Bauhaus was the place she started really “to see colours,” and look at them in context due to the work of Josef Albers. Her observe at the moment is a steady concentrate on how colours change their look relying on their environment. The fitting steadiness is essential, as her house in Samois-sur-Seine illustrates.

Within the kitchen, for instance, not one of the home equipment are framed by wooden or gentle tones. Hansen opted as an alternative for the wealthy Moss paint from File Below Pop, which lands someplace between an ochre and a mustard yellow. “I had by no means been in a position to make use of this colour in any of my initiatives,” she says. However to her, this paint is particular. It contrasts skillfully with the kitchen’s brass fittings and current tiled terracotta flooring, in addition to the chrome steel surfaces. “For me, the kitchen is a spot of a sure emancipation,” says Hansen. “I felt I had outgrown the lovable nation kitchen look. I needed one thing that mirrored my experiences and that meant a kitchen that was extra direct, city, and even considerably masculine.”