The Mix Master
When Michael DePerno moved from New York two years ago, he left behind a style legacy. Martha Stewart, Donna Karan and Polo Ralph Lauren buyers regularly raided his SoHo shop, Hope & Wilder. Now settled in Los Angeles, DePerno has opened another emporium, Ren--it means “pure” in Swedish--featuring American, Continental and Asian antiques, vintage textiles and whatever else catches the designer’s eye. “I love things with a refined simplicity and elegance that cross over into many different styles,” he says, declining to label his look. “I just buy anything I feel passionate about.”
DePerno has captured an equally sophisticated style in his Hancock home, a 1920s Mediterranean duplex, a look that was inspired by St. Nicholas Abbey--a 17th century Barbados plantation he visited five years ago. He particularly admired the abbey’s well-worn black-and-white marble tiled porch, the white fabrics, faded azure walls and polished dark wood floors. “It was a house filled with memories,” says the designer. “It felt very nostalgic, yet crisp and modern at the same time.” Doing most of the work himself, DePerno first removed the mouse gray wall-to-wall carpet. “I wanted to get down to the hardwood floors,” explains the designer, who refinished the original oak floor in a deep ebony-brown, then topped it with five coats of high-gloss Varathane for a mirror finish. Next he painted walls in soft tones--ivory, bisque and tobacco--and moldings, baseboards and ceilings in a crisp, chalk-white gloss enamel. For the finishing touches he draped windows with Irish linen in what he calls “an antique-silk hue,” and upholstered the living room furniture with fitted slipcovers of homespun French linens. A stickler for detail, he personally stripped and polished the brass hardware on all the windows, doors and sinks--”it took me a year and a half.”
DePerno, who admits he’s “a sucker for beauty,” often creates it in subtle ways. He stores flatware in vintage wire baskets inside drawers lined with French raffia. He added Swiss voile to the breakfront’s interior glass windows to disguise the clutter of files and hide his small personal collections--bolts of old ribbon, vintage wallets and small boxes. Even his closet is arranged to perfection and painted a shade of camel. Says the designer, “Even if I’m the only one to see it, why shouldn’t it be painted a beautiful color?”
An avid collector and traveler, DePerno has amassed a collection of high and low, new and old furnishings and objects. While working as a model, he briefly lived in Paris, London, Barcelona and Stockholm, haunting antique shops and flea markets. Among his personal treasures are a breakfront from a priory, inscribed “1862,” that he found in London, a collection of 19th century hand-etched Rydberg glasses from Stockholm and an early 20th century faux-bamboo stool from a Paris flea market. “I love the quality and detailing of old pieces,” he says.”I don’t care about provenance or pedigree as long as the object has soul.” DePerno rejects fads and trends for a more personal interior design: “My favorite rooms are nostalgic. Any memorable home is always a great cross-section of elements collected lovingly over time--like the abbey.”