Tuesday 13th December 2011
Actually since regaining from Venice one week ago, there have been four dinners and a funeral, two last minute.
But first we must ask the great question we always ask: what did Venice give to the Poor Little Rich Gays? Has it shaped our style and art? Did we shape its?
My day alone, after the main party had mounted for London, last Monday, was one of the most thrilling for cradling art and buildings in recent years if not in my entire span of life, although, truth told, I don’t really take Tiepolo, Veronese or Guardi. If ever the sum was greater than the parts – although I did make one great discovery. I’ll tell you about it soon.
And the Fortuny Museum was closed, did I mention?
In the larger arc, Venice is supremely Poor Little Rich Gay, highly ornamental, possibly unnecessary, lurching on mud in the middle of that wondrous bleak lagoon. Most places in some small way resemble other places, but Venice absolutely does not. Even the water in behaviour and colour is quite unique.
But within is flock wallpaper, a certain heaviness, just a wheeny bit blowsy. Damask is also loved, as a complete room lining, even of the ceiling: old-fashioned. And marble, of course.
Then I remembered, Val, that glorious spirit who flashes on through a vat of the wrong kind of spirits, once lined his bedroom (including ceiling) with a reproduction velvet from Shepherd’s Bush market. It was deep blue with gold fleur-de-lys. I must ask him how the other fittings were done. I’m sure there was a bed canopy, the whole effect very Doge.
Then one day he chucked it all away.
And the Photo Multi’s bathroom (the Multis have separate bathrooms and dressing rooms in their Riverside penthouse but one bedroom, not twin) is a marble symphony, except that it’s onyx. The Multis were done, you know, when they marble-clad their penthouse. A vicious stonemason disappeared with £25,000. Their response was to fly business-class several times to Pisa to select directly from the mines and fly in a team of Italian craftsmen to install.
In the Photo Multi’s bathroom, the very cupboard doors are marble – or onyx.
In Venice I found a exquisite church which gave birth to it – the Photo Multi’s bathroom, I mean. Santa Maria dei Miracoli. Do you know it? It’s awfully well known. A marble jewel, marble without and within.
Let the graphs below speak.
Bathroom Idea?: Marble Used at Santa Maria dei Miracoli, Venice
The Perfect Bathroom: Santa Maria dei Miracoli, Venice: Marble-lined
Why Not Try at Home? Marble Lining of Santa Maria dei Miracoli, Venice
Outside of the Bathroom: Santa Maria dei Miracoli, Venice
Veal and Damask Heaven: the Multis' Suite at the Luna Baglioni, Venice: I mean the Carpets are Veal Shade
Tented Heaven: the Multis' Damask-Lined Suite at the Luna Baglioni
The Multis' Suite at the Luna Baglioni, Venice: Casing Tape Detail
Three Nights Away: the Multis' Accoutrements at the Luna Baglioni, Venice: Note Even the Dressing Room is Ceiling-Lined
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You don’t mention that other striking modern feature of the Multis’ separate bathrooms: televisions sunk into the marble so that stock-market news can be beamed into the inner sanctum while the occupants are busy with their loofahs. Perfect!
I have it on good authority, however, that the true inspiration behind all that Multi marble was not a Venetian church but a rather more secular though very beautiful coffee-table book titled “Dictators’ Homes: Lifestyles of the World’s Most Colourful Despots”. I need hardly add that, interior decor apart, Saddam Hussein, Slobodan Milosevic and the Ceausescus have absolutely nothing in common with our own beloved Multis.
One day, Robert Nevill, you will go too far. I must insist that the Multis’ interior in no way resembles the dead vulgarity of a dict’s palace although it cost as much if not more. The Multi Home is a unique achievement and stunning assemblage of unlikely items including a toy dog on wheels, massed and heaped in a way not seen before. Also, the Multis do it themselves: the Blond Multi made a geranium corner last year, and the Photo Multi heaves and hammers and bangs, just like an ordinary Poor Little Rich Gay, flinging together, placing and styling throughout the home, with real flair.
I need a multi in my house
They have much to give
The PM would like to state that his taste in marble was inspired and formed when visiting Rome, Italy and then New York, USA in his early 20s (only a few years ago now). The floor in the Pantheon, Rome and lobby floors and walls in New York hotels and corporate office blocks are always remembered and often revisited. Venice came later….. The book of Dictators’ Homes is a reminder of how often Dictators have been inspired by the PM’s interior design skills – it is not the other way round.